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Seven Spanish Cities, 



AND THE WAY TO THEM. 



BY 



EDWARD E. HALE, 

AUTHOR OF "THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY," '*TEN TIMES ONE IS TEN," 

"IN HIS NAME," "THE INGHAM PAPERS," " HIS LEVEL BEST," 

"HOW TO DO IT," "what CAREER," ETC. 



• > " 



BOSTON: 

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY, 

1899. 



Copyright, 1883, 
By Edward E. Hale. 



5*fct»W 



CamfrritJge: 

PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, 
UNIVERSITY PRESS. 



PREFACE. 



WHY should this man write a book about 
Spain, when he was there so short a time? 

That is a very fair question. The answer is 
chiefly personal. In my very earliest days, an 
uncle, aunt, and cousin of mine, all very dear to 
me in my babyhood, went to Spain and remained 
there many years. Their letters from Spain and 
their Spanish curiosities were among the home 
excitements of my childhood; and the great 
red-letter day was the day of their return. Well 
do I recollect the box of bon-bons they brought 
me. There were some varieties in it, which I 
have never seen again to this day. 

This experience made Spain stand out from v 
the map of Europe to my boyish eyes, and I 
felt a certain surprise that the geographies and 
the newspapers had so little to tell of it. 

In after days, there came to me a time when I 
hoped, for a little while, to be Mr. Prescott's 



iv PREFACE. 

reader in his great historical work. That hope 
was soon disappointed ; but it led me to the study 
of the Spanish language, and it brought me his 
kind friendship while he lived. 

Later yet, the duty next my hand proved to 
be that of the " South American Editor " of the 
Boston " Advertiser/' and with it came the neces- 
sity of tracing the histories of Spanish fortune in 
America. 

Beside this, I may say that the great pleasure 
of my life has been the study of American his- 
tory, which has, of course, constantly thrown nje 
back upon the long narratives of Spanish dis- 
covery. All these personal experiences have 
specially interested me in Spain. 

Still, Spain is so much " out of the way," that 
in two visits to Europe I had never thought it 
possible even to hurry over it. 

But, last summer, good luck aided me to make 
the rapid tour which is described in these pages, 
under circumstances very favorable. And in 
the hope that other people, who may be as curi- 
ous as I was, may be disposed to try the same 
adventure, I print this little book of travel. 

Still, it would never have been written, I fear, 
but for the suggestion of my friend Mr. Guild, 
himself so entertaining a narrator of travel and 



PREFACE. v 

adventure. He said to me, what was very true, 
after my return, that if I promised to write for 
his "Bulletin" a sketch of Spain once a week, I 
should do it ; but that if I promised myself to 
write a book, I should always mean to and never 
do it. So I wrote the sketches for his paper, 
which, with some additions, are here before the 
reader. I hope they may start some other par- 
ties on an expedition which shall prove as 
charming as ours. 



EDWARD E. HALE. 



St. Germain en Laye, France, 
June 7, 1883. 



CONTENTS. 

Page 
Preface iii 

Introductory 5 

Chapter 

I. Bordeaux, Bayonne, and Roncesvalles 14 

II. Bayonne to Madrid 28 

III. Cordova 40 

IV. Seville 56 

V. Palos and Columbus 71 

VI. Xeres, Cadiz, and Malaga 80 

VII. Granada. The Alhambra .... 93 

VIII. Worship in Spain ........ 118 

IX. Across the Sierra 134 

X. Madrid 155 

XL Spanish Politics 166 

XII. King and Administration 182 

XIII. Perro Paco and the Bulls .... 198 

XIV. Toledo 206 

XV. Museums in Madrid 218 

XVI. Out-Doors Life 228 

XVII. Zaragoza 247 

XVIII. Northward 263 

XIX. Jaca 279 

Index 325 



SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 



INTRODUCTORY. 

I HAVE wanted to go to Spain ever since I 
can remember. 

In this last spring and summer I was able to 
carry out this wish. My visit was very short, 
but the circumstances were singularly favorable. 
From a mass of mixed memoranda, and other 
material, I am now tempted to select and print 
these notes, in the hope that they may be of 
some use to persons intending to travel, and 
possibly of some amusement to friends of mine 
who stay at home. 

The party of which I was one was a party of 
four, — my sister, my daughter, and a younger 
friend, beside myself. The ladies are all enthu- 
siastic in drawing and painting, and the treas- 
ures of Spanish fine art were for them a great 
attraction. For me — I have been for forty years 
hoping to write " The History of the Pacific 



6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

Ocean and its Shores. " At one and another 
favorable opportunity I have made collections 
of material for that history. Last winter I 
promised to furnish for the new " History of the 
United States " the chapter on the Discovery of 
California; in 1880 I had written the chapter on 
that subject for Gay's " Pictorial History." Be- 
fore I sent this chapter to the press I was desirous 
to make some examinations in detail of the doc- 
uments in Spanish archives relating to Cortez's 
discovery of California and to the subsequent 
explorations of different adventurers. I had 
thus an archaeological object; the ladies had an 
artistic object; and all of us were glad to be "off 
soundings," and to have what the English of 
Dryden's day would have called " a good time." 
It is said that phrase is lost to the English of 
to-day. So much the worse for them. New 
Englanders will understand it. 

It may as well be said in the outset that we 
found all we sought in Spain, and very much 
more. 

Dear Michael Faraday said once, when he 
was asked to examine something with a micro- 
scope, " What am I expected to see?" It seems 
but fair to the reader of these notes — doubt- 
ful whether he will go on or whether he will 
not explore another page — it seems but fair 
to make such an explanation as I have now 



INTRODUCTORY. 7 

made as to what he is expected to find if he 
perseveres. 

All sorts of advice were lavished on me when 
the little public of my friends fairly found out 
that I was going. There was a party who were 
eager that I should go in winter. Another, 
headed by those who had read " A Summer in 
Spain," were equally eager that I should go in 
summer. Another set advised autumn ; and yet 
a fourth, spring. Privately, in my own mind, I 
determined that I would go when I could. This 
plan brought upon me, however, a volley of re- 
monstrances from those who were sure that 
May and June were deadly months in Spain. 
I had information laid before me tending to the 
belief that annually, in those months, the whole 
population of Spain died of typhoid fever, and 
was buried by the survivors. To which infor- 
mation I replied steadily, that when I came to 
London I would take advice. " Mr. Lowell would 
certainly know." It is always well to shield 
one's self under the shelter of a great name. 
The constituents were pacified; they soon for- 
got their own opinions, and I was left to form 
my own. When I came to London I found that 
my advisers thought I had better do much as I 
chose, — as sound advisers are apt to think 
when they talk to a man of sense. All ended, 
therefore, in my leaving Paris for Spain on the 



8 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

I oth of May. And the reader who doubts at 
this point may be reassured when he learns that 
I crossed the Pyrenees northward on my return 
— and left Spain for France — on the 27th of 
June. These notes, therefore, cover a period of 
only seven weeks. 

As this is a chapter of introductions, I will 
here give a few suggestions as to language. I 
had had to read Spanish more or less since 
I was sixteen years old. I thought for a week, 
at that time, that I was to be Mr. Prescott's 
reader and amanuensis in the preparation of his 
" History of the Conquest of Mexico. " That 
hope was dispelled at once ; but it did happen 
that for six years I was the " South American edi- 
tor " of the Boston " Daily Advertiser." Many a 
time at midnight have I manufactured intelligible 
news out of piles of unintelligible journals which 
had just been captured by our enterprising 
news-collectors. Of that life a little sketch was 
once published by me — not very badly exagger- 
ated — in the Boston " Miscellany.- 1 In reading 
American history, of course, I have been obliged 
to read much Spanish. But I had never talked 
in that language at all. By way of preparation, 
then, I took on board the " Germanic " when I 
sailed for Europe, Prendergast's " Mastery " 

1 See page 79 in " The Man without a Country, and other 
Tales," by E. E. Hale. 



INTRODUCTORY. 9 

hand-book of the Spanish language, and, with 
the aid of a friend, I began on the voyage. 
Before I left Spain I could make myself un- 
derstood, and could follow conversation, and 
public address more easily, than conversation- 
I spoke wretchedly, of course. But my expe- 
rience gives me great confidence in the " Mas- 
tery system." I had, long before, arrived at 
great distrust of all the ordinary systems. 

Of the " Mastery system," the principle is that 
you learn the hardest idioms first. 

It is thought that if you throw a boy into 
twenty feet of water and he paddles ashore, 
he will never after be afraid to go into the 
water. 

It is also thought that a man will not hesitate 
to say, " Bring me a cup of tea," if he have 
learned to say fluently, " However early a riser 
you may be, I am sure you are not so much so 
as this poor man, for whatever the season may 
be, and whatever weather it is, he always rises 
before the sun." 

Mr. Prendergast goes so far as to say that but 
a little more than a hundred words are needed in 
any language for all those phrases which express 
the relation of things to each other. He gives a 
list of these words in English. The list begins 
with "unless, whether, although, yet; " and it 
ends with " afterwards, always, well, ago, than." 



IO SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

He says — and I think truly — that in a new lan- 
guage one's timidity comes from his fear about 
using such words as these. It is not nouns or 
verbs which trouble us. Now, courage, or the 
willingness to speak, is far more important than 
a large vocabulary of words. The " Mastery " 
theory is, that if you learn absolutely well fifteen 
sentences, which contain all these necessary 
words of relation, you will plunge almost fear- 
lessly into conversation. Of this theory I am a 
living confirmation. For here am I, of nature 
very timid and shamefaced, who, under Mr. 
Prendergast's lead, boldly attacked, in three 
weeks' time, porters, fellow-travellers, literati, 
and table companions. Of course I made 
mistakes, as when the apothecary thought I 
wanted " little knives/' when I was seeking 
" phial corks." This was because I did not roll 
the R enough in corckillo, and he thought I 
said cuckillo. But the confidence is what you 
need. 

I doubt whether most people recollect how 
few words are necessary for the intelligent in- 
terchange of opinion. The Book of Joshua con- 
tains but six hundred and twelve different words, 
exclusive of proper names. Learn every day 
thirty words of any language, and keep up 
your study for twenty-one days, and you have 
learned words enough to express ideas and 



INTRODUCTORY. II 

narratives as varied as are those in the Book of 
Joshua. You have learned enough for most 
practical purposes. Now, a traveller in a new 
country who keeps his eyes open, reads the 
signs in the streets, and tries to read the daily 
newspapers, learns much more than thirty words 
a day. 

For persons who want to learn Spanish I will 
say one word more. Other persons may skip 
this paragraph. To an Englishman or an Amer- 
ican, Spanish is what school-boys call " hog 
Latin;" that is, it is made up of a Latin vocabu- 
lary in the forms of a Teutonic or northern 
grammar, and the idiom of this northern gram- 
mar is very like the idiom of English. I sup- 
pose the history of the thing to be this. The 
Goths from the North of Europe conquered 
Spain. They were far too proud to learn Latin 
grammar. But the people they conquered vir- 
tually spoke Latin. The Goths had to speak in 
their words, but with the pride of conquerors 
they kept to their own idiom. The result is the 
Spanish language. Thus, a Spaniard says, Yo 
he hablado, where an Englishman says, " I have 
spoken ; " but where the Roman, if he used the 
same root as the Spaniard, would have said 
Fabulavi. Students of language will see that 
the same original roots are used both in the 
Roman and Spanish form. But the order is 



12 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

exactly reversed. Fabul-av-i reveals, in the 
transfer, " I — 'av — fabled/' 

For this reason it is easier for an Englishman 
or an American to learn Spanish than it is for a 
Frenchman, because our language retains much 
more Teutonic or German idiom than does the 
French. 

One more direction : if by any misfortune 
you know any Italian when you go to Spain, for- 
get it. It is only a snare and a delusion. The 
Italian idiom is based closely on the Latin. The 
Spanish, as has been said, is a northern idiom. 
Then, for a thousand reasons, different roots 
have been chosen in the two peninsulas, since 
their governments were parted, for the expres- 
sion of the same idea. Speaking in general, I 
should say that you could guess quite as many 
Spanish words from your knowledge of English 
as from your knowledge of Italian. It may be 
added that the Spaniards dislike the Italians, 
and that the dislike is mutual. I fancy that the 
use of an Italian word is as disagreeable to a 
Spaniard as is the use of a German word to a 
Hungarian. 

I certainly would not advise any person to go 
to Spain without an interpreter, unless he were 
willing to take some pains to learn something of 
the language. But the Spaniards are very cour- 
teous and patient, willing to meet you much 



INTRODUCTORY. 1 3 

more than half-way; and for these and other 
reasons, Spanish is by far the easiest language 
to which a person speaking English can address 
himself. 



CHAPTER I. 

BORDEAUX, BAYONNE, AND RONCESVALLES. 

On the tenth day of April I left Paris with 
my daughter to join the other members of my 
party at Bordeaux. We broke the route by 
spending the night at Orleans. We made the 
whole journey by rail. Although flying over 
the country at fifty kilometres an hour, I found 
a special interest in it, because Franklin and 
Adams, and our other revolutionary envoys, so 
often had to jumble across this same country in 
the rude vehicles of their time. Bordeaux was 
a great port for our privateers and merchant- 
men, and our commissioners generally got their 
first notion of Europe in the four or five days 
which they spent in this journey of five hundred 
miles. John Adams first went to the theatre at 
Bordeaux, for instance, when he was forty-three 
years old, and he says in a note to his Diary 
that our American theatres did not exist then 
even in contemplation. Not to cumber notes 
on Spain with full accounts of travelling in 
France, I will say that the beauty of the French 



BORDEAUX. 15 

landscape at the end of April is curiously en- 
hanced by the glory of their crimson clover. 
This is an annual clover {Trifolium incarnatum) y 
which grows very thickly and rankly, with cylin- 
drical heads of brilliant crimson flowers. I had 
been looking for it for forty years, and have 
often asked friends, who had forgotten the re- 
quest, to bring me seeds of it. But I had never 
seen it till now. 

It is difficult to describe the glory of the long 
fields of it blazing with crimson color. The 
effect of it in bloom is as fine as a rich crimson 
coleus bed would be, if you can imagine such a 
bed of ten or fifteen acres. One feels all along 
the meaning of the epigram that Napoleon 
changed the landscape of France. I believe, in 
fact, it was not Napoleon, but that the landscape 
was changed by the enactments of the Conven- 
tion. All the same it is true that the sub- 
division of the land into small farms is perfectly 
discernible even to a traveller by rail. 

The change from Paris to Bordeaux was that 
from spring in its freshness to full summer. In 
the first place, the distance is more than that 
from Boston to Washington. The trains do this 
at forty miles an hour. 

Bordeaux itself is a wide-awake, active, and 
successful city. At the moment we were there 
they were finishing, with great energy, a tern- 



1 6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

porary building for a Mechanics' Fair, as we 
should call it, which was to be opened a few days 
after. The exterior paintings of architecture on 
canvas fronts were already up, for the joy of the 
Sunday crowds. There is a very pretty park, 
with ponds and paths for the delectation of 
children, within easy walking distance; and a 
very pleasant afternoon resort it is, much more 
pleasant for the purpose than anything we have 
close at hand at home. The guide-books call 
the theatre the largest in France. Before the 
new opera-house was built in Paris, I think this 
may have been true. But we were not tempted 
into the theatre. The days of our stay were hot, 
and we spent our evenings on the tops of the 
street-cars, which run along the river's edge, I 
know not how far, either way, and give fascinat- 
ing glimpses of French life to those who will 
take seats, — much more to the point, I think, 
than anything we should have found on the 
other side of the foot-lights. 

Some Roman ruins, in very good preserva- 
tion, recall the time when Bordeaux was the 
Burdigala of the Romans, and the artists of our 
little party (which, as the reader will see, means 
all of them, in a modified sense) worked loyally 
on these first bits of the picturesque of eighteen 
centuries ago. Here was our first experience 
of sitting to draw in an open carriage, to the de- 



BORDEAUX. 17 

light of street-boys, — with the sympathy of the 
cocker, — in utter disgust at one's own failure, 
but with the half hope that months afterwards 
the blotch might bring back some pleasant 
memories. 

Of the cathedral — which has some interest- 
ing memorials of the English occupation in the 
days of the Black Prince — I had much to say 
in my notes of the time. But I am conscious 
that any one who follows these sketches will 
find only too much of the effort to describe the 
indescribable in the way of cathedrals. So I 
spare him here and now. 

At Bordeaux one comes into fairy-land, or 
into the Romance-land, which is next door. 
Huon of Bordeaux has left traces of his exploits 
where he has not left traces of his name, per- 
haps. The worthy Archbishop Turpin must 
not be confounded with Dick Turpin of English 
ballads. The Archbishop was Charlemagne's 
archbishop, and in the famous retreat from 
Spain did his share of the fighting. He was 
killed in one story; but as he himself wrote 
another, it may be that he was not killed for 
certain. And now, every inch we go, we shall 
be coming nearer and nearer to all the legend- 
ary tales of that chivalry. 

Huon of Bordeaux had killed an infamous 
(imaginary) son of Charlemagne, whose name 



1 8 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

was Chariot, who had attacked Huon's brother 
when unarmed. Charlemagne had the matter 
explained to him; but he still mourned over 
his boy, whom Huon had cut into two pieces. 
" I receive thy homage," he said, " and I grant 
my pardon ; but it is on these conditions : You 
shall go at once to the Sultan Gaudisso; you 
shall present yourself before him as he sits at 
meat; you shall cut off the head of his most 
illustrious guest; you shall kiss three times on 
the mouth the fair princess, his daughter; and 
you shall demand of the Sultan, as a token of 
tribute from me, a handful of the white hair of 
his beard and four grinders from his jaws." All 
of which, with the assistance of Oberon, Huon 
eventually did ; and he brought home the Prin- 
cess Clarimunda as his bride. 

But, alas ! of Huon we found no monument 
in Bordeaux, So ungrateful are cities to their 
princes! It was only the 15th of May when 
our pleasant stay here ended. The weather 
was warm as summer. The birds were sing- 
ing in the trees, and these were in full spring 
beauty. We were eating strawberries at every 
meal, and felt that we were in the South 
indeed. 

And here I am tempted to say, for the benefit 
of American travellers, that the direct line from 
New York to Bordeaux seems to be an admi- 



BAYONNE. 19 

rable line of steamers, well appointed and well 
managed. The ladies of our party who joined 
us here were more than satisfied with their ac- 
commodations on the " Chateau Lafite. ,, Trav- 
ellers from America to the South of Europe, of 
course, save a bad angle by taking this line, and 
in winter or spring are in less danger of cold 
weather. The passengers now are almost all 
French or Spanish, so that you have a chance 
to brush up your languages on the way. Let 
the reader remember that the latitude of Bor- 
deaux is 44 50' N., while that of New York is 
40 42' N. I had heard the boats from New 
York to Cadiz highly spoken of; but none of our 
party tried these. The latitude of Cadiz is 36 
31' N. The line from New York to Cadiz is, 
therefore, about as much south of a direct east 
course as that of Bordeaux is north. 

I have long held to the theory that two hun- 
dred miles a day on the outside is quite enough 
for railway travel. If you compass sea and land 
to see a country, you may as well see it. We 
took the route into Spain, therefore, by staying 
overnight at Bayonne, which is perhaps one 
hundred and twenty miles from Bordeaux. On 
the way there we saw pitckeries, for the manu- 
facture of pitch and turpentine, in immense arti- 
ficial forests, where the trees have been planted 
in straight lines. In the midst of these planta- 



20 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

tions are groves of cork-trees, lest the bottles of 
the world should be unstopped. And finally 
you come out on those beautiful stone-pines, 
with their umbrella tops, into a lovely under- 
growth of fern, heath, gorse, and broom in blos- 
som; poppies and scarlet clover blazing; and 
roses in the gardens in bloom. For fully sev- 
enty-five miles the road passed between hedges 
of hawthorn coming into bloom, which the 
railroad people have planted for the protection 
of their line. Till Bayonne, the strawberries we 
ate had been brought from the south, as in 
Boston we eat strawberries from Norfolk. But 
in Bayonne, on the 15th, we had green peas and 
strawberries from their own garden. The grape- 
vine over the trellis in my bedroom was in full 
leaf. 

At Dax the road " bifurcates," and the pas- 
sengers for fashionable Pau turn east, while we 
turn to the southwest. Dax, of course, reminds 
one of no name in the world but Aix ; and one's 
philology comes to one's rescue, for Aix is 
what is left* of Aquis, and Dax is what is left 
of De Aquis, both these places having been 
watering-places to the Romans, as they are to 
their descendants. 

In Bayonne we were reminded again, as we 
had been at Bordeaux, by memories of the Eng- 
lish occupation in those days when English 



BAYONNE. 21 

princes were indeed kings of half France, and, 
for that matter, called themselves kings of Spain 
as well. It is a strong fortress, — and one sees 
the great Vauban's work still of use, — with old 
castles. The two rivers, Nive and Adour, divide 
the city into Great Bayonne, Little Bayonne, 
and Saint-Esprit, a suburb. We mounted to a 
church which had memorials of the Black Prince, 
who, with his fair cousin, Joan of Kent, — who 
was his second wife, — lived and reigned in these 
parts, after his victories had established his fath- 
er's farm here. Richard II. was born here. In- 
deed, it was virtually by the route which the 
Black Prince followed in his Spanish conquests 
that we passed into Spain. 

In my boyhood's days there were some boys 
in Boston who were not afraid to buckle their 
stilts to their legs, below the knee, and with 
nothing in their hands but a short balancing- 
pole, to walk forth high above the rest of the 
human race. I see that in these more degener- 
ate days boys are satisfied to make their stilts 
into a sort of crutches, on which the foot perches, 
and by which a round-shouldered lad stumbles 
along more slowly than he can walk without. 
The railroad, as we travel south, bears us 
through the Landes, famous to stilt lovers, as 
the region where men walk on stilts five feet 
high. One of these human storks revealed 



22 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

himself to a bright lookout as our train dashed 
on. They march mile upon mile with them, 
much faster than a man can walk without 
them. 1 

From Bayonne to the frontier is not a long 
ride, and you have charming views of the sea. 
The famous watering-places of Biarritz and San 
Sebastian are on this coast ; they come where 
the Bay of Biscay cuts deepest into the land. 
You pass the frontier at Irun, and all carriages 
are changed. For when the railway system was 
adopted in Spain, the Spaniards, very sensibly, 
as I should say, insisted on having a gauge of 
their own ; so that they need not be invaded 
too easily by a French army with French en- 
gines and carriages. From the station you act- 
ually see the little watering-place of Fontarabia. 
Biarritz and Fontarabia! Think of mixing up 
Napoleon and his Eugenie with Charlemagne 
and his Roland ! Think of hearing a conductor 
call " Fontarabia " ! Think of the shriek of the 

1 How curious a thing is human testimony ! Fifty-eight years 
ago, Mrs. Lucretia Everett, well remembered as a most charm- 
ing and accomplished lady, passed over this route in a post 
carriage. Writing from Bayonne, in a letter which lies before 
me, she says : " We expected to see the people walking on stilts, 
as it was said they did habitually. But we have not been fortu- 
nate enough to have our curiosity gratified in this respect, and 
on inquiring of the people, they said it had never been the cus- 
tom among them." 



RONCESVALLES. 23 

whistle of your engine, when you are listening 
for 

" that dread horn 
On Fontarabian echoes borne " ! 



RONCESVALLES. 

I remember that some Englishman growls 
because he does not like to be told that a 
branch line runs to Caradoc. I was brutal 
enough to take down Bradshaw, when I saw 
this plaint, and I found that, in fact, there is no 
station near Caradoc. I pursued my researches 
so far, indeed, as to find that there is no brook 
which would float a birch canoe there, far less 
any on which the beautiful barge could come 
up under the castle window. But I never was 
brute enough to tell that to any one before 
now. 

The guide-book explains that you are at some 
distance from the famous pass at Roncesvalles. 
All the same, you understand all about it. The 
whole region suggests passes, — passes like Ther- 
mopylae between the mountains and the sea, 
and passes of which Roncesvalles was one, — as 
you go through the mountains. 

They do say, now, that the famous fight at 
Roncesvalles was nothing but a foraging skir- 
mish, in which the Spaniards cut off a small 
rear-guard of Charlemagne's. But they did not 



24 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

say so once. Here is Bishop Turpin's account 
of it, — a good deal abridged by this copyist, — 
if, indeed, the Bishop lived to write it, as above 
questioned. 

" Charles now began his march through the 
pass of the mountains, giving the command of 
the rear to his nephew Roland and to Oliver, 
Count of Auvergne, ordering them to keep the 
pass at Ronceval with thirty thousand men, while 
he passed it with the rest of the army. . . . 
When he had safely passed the narrow strait 
between the mountains, with twenty thousand 
of his warriors, with Turpin, the archbishop, 
and Ganalon, and while the rear kept guard, 
early in the morning Marsir and Beligard, rush- 
ing down from the hills, where by Ganalon's 
advice they had lain two days in ambush, form- 
ing their troops into two great divisions, and 
with the first of twenty thousand men attacked 
our army, which, making a bold resistance, 
fought from morning to the third hour, and 
utterly destroyed the enemy. But a fresh corps 
of thirty thousand Saracens now poured furi- 
ously down upon the Christians, already faint 
and exhausted with fighting so long, and smote 
them from high to low, so that scarcely one 
escaped. Some were transpierced with lances, 
some killed with clubs ; others beheaded, burned, 
flayed alive, or suspended upon trees. Only 



RONCESVALLES. 2$ 

Roland, Baldwin, and Theodoric were left; 
the last two gained the woods, and finally- 
escaped. . . . 

" As Roland was returning after the battle to 
view the Saracen army, ascending a lofty hill, 
and seeing many Christians returning by the 
Ronceval road, he blew his horn, and was joined 
by about a hundred of them, with whom he 
returned to a black Saracen, whom he had cap- 
tured and bound, and promised to give him his 
life if he would show him Marsir, which having 
been done he set him at liberty. Roland was 
soon again among the thickest of the enemy, 
and finding one of huger stature than the rest 
he hewed him and his horse in twain, so that 
the halves fell different ways. Marsir and his 
companions then fled; but Roland, trusting to 
divine aid, rushed forward and slew Marsir 
upon the spot. But by this time all his Chris- 
tian companions were slain, and Roland sorely 
wounded in five places by lances and grievously 
battered with stones. Beligard, seeing Marsir 
had fallen, retired from the field, whilst Theo- 
doric and Baldwin and some few other Chris- 
tians made their way through the pass, towards 
which Roland came likewise, and, alighting from 
his steed, stretched himself on the ground near 
a block of marble. 

" Here he drew his sword Durenda, which he 



26 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

would sooner have lost his arm than parted with, 
and addressed it in these words : — 

" ' O sword of unparalleled brightness, ex- 
cellent dimensions, admirable temper, and hilt 
of the whitest ivory ; decorated with a splendid 
cross of gold, topped by a berylline apple, en- 
graved with the sacred name of God, endued 
with keenness and every other virtue, — who now 
shall wield thee in battle, who shall call thee 
master?' and at the end of a long address he 
said : * Thus do I prevent thy falling into the 
hands of the Saracens/ So saying he struck 
the block of marble twice, and cleft it to the 
midst and broke the sword in twain. 

" He now blew a loud blast with his horn. 
This horn was endued with such power that all 
other horns were split by its sound; and at 
this time Roland blew with such force that he 
burst the veins and nerves of his neck. Charle- 
magne heard the sound eight miles away, but 
the false traitor Ganalon persuaded him that 
Roland had used it only in hunting. Roland, 
meanwhile, grew very thirsty, and asked Bald- 
win for water. But Baldwin could find none. 
He mounted his horse, and galloped for aid to 
the army. Roland offered this confession : — 

" ' O Father, true, who canst not lie ; 

Who didst Lazarus raise with life again, 
And Daniel shield in the lion's den, — 
Shield my soul from its peril due, 
For the sins sinned my lifetime through ; ' — 



RONCESVALLES. 27 

and then his soul winged its flight from his 
body, and was borne by angels to Paradise, 
where he reigns with transcendent glory, united 
by his meritorious deeds to the blessed choir of 
martyrs." 

Thus far Bishop Turpin. 

The Spanish ballads seldom give the same 
names to any of the chiefs, but Roland does ap- 
pear as Roldan. They make the French leader, 
Durandarte, whose name perhaps comes from 
Roland's sword, say to Montesinos, as he dies : 

" O my cousin Montesinos, 
Foully has this battle sped ; 
On the field our hero Roldan, 
Dona Alda's husband, 's dead." 

Yet another Spanish ballad makes Bernardo 

del Carpio to be the conqueror. Yes, Dick, the 

same you used to speak about at the high school, 

who 

u In the dust sat down." 

In Tom Hood's charming version of the 
Chanson of Roland, the hero had just ceased to 
breathe when Charlemagne arrived on the field. 

Not till he had utterly destroyed the army 
would he consent to dismount from his horse. 
He tore his gray hair and long beard, and 
ordered the bodies of Turpin, Oliver, Mirliton, 
and the rest to be placed in coffins of black 
marble, and bore them back to France with all 
honor. 



CHAPTER II. 

BAYONNE TO MADRID. 

THE journey to Burgos from Bayonne is 
charming all the way. The whole detention at 
Irun is, perhaps, half an hour. The ridge of the 
Pyrenees holds westward along the northern 
shore, but there are some fine glimpses of the 
Bay of Biscay. You see the island, which was 
neutral ground, in the river where French kings 
and Spanish princes used to meet. Either it was 
then larger, or they took very little room. The- 
ophile Gautier, who wrote an amusing book of 
travels here, says it is no bigger than a fried sole ; 
nor is this very much out of the way. 

The Basques look their character, — intelli- 
gent, handsome, serious people, — the Yankees 
of Spain. I was able at Bayonne to buy a book 
of Basque songs, with music and translations, 
but not somebody's archaeological studies there. 
There are people who tell you that these fisher- 
men knew of the Newfoundland coast before 
Cabot, and likely enough the right explorer in 
the old records could find out now. 



BURGOS TO MADRID. 29 

The high land is not merely a line on the sea. 
All the way from Irun to Burgos is a difficult 
passage, by admirable engineering, through 
mountain passes. It is wonderfully picturesque, 
and wherever we could draw we were kept busy. 
There is one pass which we descended, thorough- 
ly Swiss in its sudden turns and bold huggings 
of the stream. There are, alas ! only too many 
tunnels for the picturesque. M. counted four- 
teen in four miles, between two stations. The 
people work bravely in their fields, and I think 
grow wheat quite high up. It may not be wheat, 
but looked like wheat in the blade. The news- 
paper spoke of very severe heat in Madrid. But 
we were glad of all our wraps as night came 
on. 

The cathedral at Burgos is wonderful. It is 
300 feet long, with the addition, beside that of 
the Constable's Chapel, built on east of the choir 
proper. I have seen nothing like it. It is not 
so large as Cologne. But the finish is perfect. 
The glass was unfortunately broken in the ex- 
plosion of a magazine when Wellington was 
fighting here. But excepting that, there is very 
little sign of the havoc of time. The marvel is 
that even little details of the past exist as they 
might in the thirteenth or fourteenth century. 
The full prospective of the nave is broken by a 
large chapel for service, introduced first in the 



30 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

middle of it. One end of this is a screen in bronze 
or brass, which is very grand ; not more than two 
hundred years old I fancy, certainly if the Renais- 
sance, but singularly rich in the multitude and va- 
riety of the figures. O'Shea's faithful guide-book 
tells me that it was begun in 1577 and completed 
in 1593. It is a series of absolutely complete re- 
lievos of scenes in the Old and New Testament 
first separated by the architectural work, which is 
arranged as if this were a sort of fagade three 
stories high. 

Thanks to their maintaining, in a fashion, the 
same faith which built the cathedral, the several 
chapels are kept up sympathetically, and Mass 
is said in each of them every day. In one they 
show the wooden effigy of Christ on the cross, 
which, the story says, was picked up floating at 
sea wrapped in a buffalo skin. It is supposed to 
be the work of Nicodemus himself. Whoever 
made it, it is powerful, strong, and good sculpture. 
The head falls heavily and sadly on the right 
shoulder, and the color of the wood is not unfit 
for the purpose. Eyelashes, beard and other 
hair are real hair, but the effect is not bad. 

In one of the chapels, above and around the 
altar is a curious genealogical tree of Christ. 
Either carved, or possibly in terra cotta, Abra- 
ham lies in the middle above the altar asleep, 
and this is his dream. From his head rises a 



BURGOS TO MADRID. 3 1 

tree, of which you see the roots surrounding him. 
Of this tree the various fruits and leaves are im- 
portant people in Christ's genealogy; indeed, I 
am not sure but all the fifty-one in Matthew are 
there. They are painted quite brilliantly, and 
the tout ensemble is very gorgeous. 

But the general effect of the cathedral is not 
showy, but severe. Oddly enough, I saw none of 
the May adoration of the Virgin which we have 
seen everywhere in France, there being no spe- 
cial altar adorned with white flowers in her honor. 
While we were there, a procession started with 
the hat to go round the city, and the guide told 
us this was a solemn act, repeated every year at 
this time. This may be one of the Marian so- 
lemnities. But I saw no published statement to 
this effect. 

Now, the contrast between this absolutely lav- 
ish expenditure of past ages in the cathedral, and 
the abject poverty of the present time, is amaz- 
ing. The shops, of which there are legions, are 
the drollest rattle-traps of second and tenth 
hand ware. 

The beggars are dressed in cloaks which, seri- 
ously, may have paraded in processions with 
Columbus. There is something amazing in the 
rags. The city is one side of a little brook, 
which is called a river, and by the sides of which 
there are pretty promenades. The railway sta- 



32 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

tion is the other, and the segregation of Burgos 
from modern life is perfectly typified by the 
gulf between. There is no effort, as at Worces- 
ter or other such places, to connect the new 
monster with the old dignity. You would say 
they never heard of the railways, and, if they 
could help it, never meant to. 

If our ballad-writing really referred to the af- 
fairs of our own day, — as the severest critics 
say it should, — I should thus describe the be- 
ginning of our journey to Madrid : — 

" My heart was happy when I turned from Burgos to Valla- 
dolid, 
So happy, that I tell you all the stupid actions that I did. 
I met a porter on my way, he stopped me at the station, 
And the way he marked my baules gave me days of con- 
sternation ; 
Indeed, you might remark that he brought me news of pain, 
So long a time it was before I saw my trunks again." 

But I know that this reader would follow with 
more interest Mr. Lockhart's version of the Span- 
ish ballad : — 

VALLADOLID. 

" My heart was happy when I turned from Burgos to Vallado- 
lid; 
My heart that day was light and gay, it bounded like a kid. 
I met a Palmer on the way, my horse he bade me rein, — 
* I left Valladolid to-day, I bring thee news of pain ! 
The lady-love whom thou dost seek in gladness and in cheer, 
Closed is her eye and cold her cheek, I saw her on her bier.' " 



BURGOS TO MADRID. 33 

In the secrecy of these pages, I will confess 
that I think this version very poor, and that 
many others of Mr. Lockhart's are in the same 
category. I venture to say that the rhyme to 
" Valladolid" is poor. The lines should have 
been something like this : — 

" My heart was happy when I turned from Burgos to Valla- 
dolid ; 
My heart was gay and light that day through Prado and 
through alley led." 

An absolute rhyme seems to require a refer- 
ence to the Fire Brigade of that time, thus : — 

" My heart was happy when I turned from Burgos to Vallado- 
lid — 
Happy as those who take the hose when by the Hook and 
Ladder led." 

I met in Madrid with the very bright papers 
in " Harper's Monthly " in which Mr. Lathrop and 
Mr. Reinhart described their experiences with 
much spirit and fun. Their drawings in Burgos, 
in many instances, represented the very points 
where we had tried to bring away our remem- 
brances on paper. 

But I cannot even now understand the way in 
which they speak of coming, as if it were a wild 
adventure. As I have said, the railway is admi- 
rable, and of confessedly the very highest grade 
of engineering. The arrangements of adminis- 

3 



34 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

tration are perfect. The people are gentle, sim- 
ple, and singularly courteous and obliging. They 
remind me of the quiet dignity of those nice 
New Englanders you may see at Block Island. 
I can only imagine that Englishmen, bully- 
ing round and expecting to use every man as a 
servant, may have received in return the rude- 
ness they gave. But for us, who speak as we 
should speak in America to a man in a shop, or 
a person of whom we asked the way, — which, I 
need not say, we often have to do, — there has 
been nothing but a courteous civility. Perhaps I 
ought to except one railroad man, who thought 
I wanted four sleeping-cars to take me fifty miles 
in the evening. But that was perhaps the fault 
of my Spanish as much as of his temper. 

Perhaps it is the business of a guide-book to 
grumble, as it is for an art critic to find fault. 
But I do not think so. I think that the art 
critic generally shows that he is a fool ; and, in 
the case of Spain, I am sure that the men who 
made Murray's first volume and O'Shea's book 
do not appreciate the fine features of the country 
or the fine qualities of the people. 

Murray's second volume, by Mr. Ford, is quite 
a different book, but seems to me overrated ; 
I hope, before this book passes the press, that 
Madame Riano's new edition of it may be before 
the public. 



BURGOS TO MADRID. 35 

This is sure, that a man must have travelled 
in America very little, if he finds much fault 
with the external arrangements for travellers in 
Spain. A friend at Madrid asked how I found 
the inn at Burgos. I said we were perfectly 
comfortable, — that the people were very oblig- 
ing and the beds neat and clean. 

"And the food?" 

" Why," I said, " it was Spanish, and very 
nice ; served perfectly, neatly, warm, and well." 

" Oh," she said, " it is easy to see that you are 
easily pleased." 

Perhaps I am. But I could have gone on to 
say to her that outside the Tremont or the 
Parker House, or half a dozen of such American 
hotels, I could have nowhere in America been 
as attentively or practically as well served. The 
service has the element of personal attention and 
desire to please, of which hotel service with us is 
fatally destitute. 

When it comes to the railways, it is true that 
I did find that the time-tables did not look as if 
they were adjusted for me, or their plans did 
not suit me. It is, therefore, just possible that 
the administration had not heard that I was com- 
ing. For I like to travel in the daytime, as I 
have said. If I had my own way, I would travel 
from nine till one. I would then rest in a neat, 
quiet country hotel until the hour before dark. 



$6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

For two hours then I would resume my journey, 
but for no longer time. And possibly travel 
may be so arranged in Arcadia, when Arcadia 
shall grow large enough for such railway lines. 

But, unfortunately, the mercantile public do 
not travel to see the country. They want to 
pass through the country by night, as far as pos- 
sible, so that they may have as much daylight as 
possible for their business in large towns. That 
is to say, the artist, loafer, student, poet, or man 
of leisure has one wish in travelling, and the 
men of business have another, which is diametri- 
cally opposite. The first class writes the guide- 
books, the sketches of travel, and describes the 
railway. The second class builds the railways 
and pays for them. If one who belongs to the 
first class, as I do, will squarely remind himself 
that he and his never could and never would 
have created the railway system, he may find it 
easier to accept the inevitable, and adapt himself, 
without grumbling, to the arrangements made 
by and for the people who do build them. 

The newspapers had been warning us all 
through the early days of May that the heat of 
Madrid was intolerable. But I arrived there on 
a day which was comfortable enough, and for 
the next three days it rained a considerable part 
of the time. 

If I wrote in the ordinary traveller style, I 



BURGOS TO MADRID. 37 

should say it always rained in Madrid. But had 
I spent a week there a fortnight before, I should 
have said that it was always as hot as — a glass 
furnace. So unreliable are first impressions. 
The Festa of Ascencion was going on, my first 
day. It was interrupted by a shower of rain 
and hail. As we rode (in a tram-car) to the 
gallery, when we came to the Prado it was 
raining and hailing so like fury that the streets 
were running rivers, and we were glad to pay 
three cents each to go on in the car to the end of 
its route, and come back again. 

But at once we were told that this is purely 
exceptional. There had been no rain before in 
Madrid for a month, and all Madrid may be 
supposed to bless us for bringing it. If we 
should stay a month more, no such thing might 
happen again. I am sorry to say that, as in 
most countries I have ever lived in, farmers are 
dying for rain, and that this year's harvest, what- 
ever that may be on these barren hills three thou- 
sand feet above the sea, is supposed to be lost 
irremediably. Oddly enough, in the midst of 
this destitution we ate strawberries, asparagus, 
string-beans, and new potatoes, not brought from 
afar. I cannot quite understand this ; nor have 
I met any one who explains it. 

The English guide-books, and other authori- 
ties as superficial, can make nothing of Madrid, 



38 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

and occupy themselves very much by telling 
you what it is not. I had the notion that it was 
a sort of manufactured city like Munich. So it 
is in a sense ; but when one thinks, one sees why 
it is manufactured, and the place becomes inter- 
esting, because intelligible. Whoever built it 
wanted to do what Victoria did in founding Ot- 
tawa, and our fathers in making Washington; 
viz., to break up the local jealousies of the pro- 
vincial cities. In that regard it is very like 
Washington. But it is as large as Boston. 
There is a very large garrison, all the life of a 
court and of a parliament, and the government 
spends money like water. 

Now you will observe, in a moment, that I 
might say many of these things of the city of 
Washington. But in my first and second stay 
in Madrid I was noticing resemblances between 
the two cities. Thus there are splendid public 
buildings and some very wretched private ones. 
Some very great projects have been admirably 
carried through, and some have been begun 
upon and never finished. Just now they change 
their kings as often as we change our presidents, 
and their administrations as often as we change 
our cabinets. I fancy, therefore, that there is 
with pretty much anybody you meet that sense 
of uncertainty, almost of lottery, which is so 
amusing at Washington. It is this which makes 



BURGOS TO MADRID. 39 

everybody there so eager to get what he can out 
of to-day. Everybody is willing to condone yes- 
terday's faults ; and though everybody is schem- 
ing, nobody expects much from to-morrow, or 
relies much upon it. Perhaps this is a fancy, 
but it seems to me that you see the same thing 
in Madrid. The books call it a mock Paris ; but 
it did not seem in the least to me like Paris, and 
I did not think it pretended to. There is a cer- 
tain gravity in the demeanor of the men, — just 
what we should call " Spanish gravity " at home. 
Of every gentleman you meet in the street you 
would say in Boston, u That man is certainly a 
Spanish teacher of languages. " And you would 
be sorry for him, because he looked so grave. 
You would say, " Poor fellow ! I am so sorry 
for him, because he is an exile. " 

I reserve to myself the right in the order of 
these sketches to describe the museums and 
other galleries of Madrid at some little length 
by and by. We shall all have comfortably re- 
turned to Madrid then, " to inhabit there," and 
we can then " dilate with the right emotions." 

But, as I say, we will discuss all this at more 
length by and by. 

We have merely come to Madrid, at this time, 
on our way to the southern cities; and we hurry 
to them because we are afraid of the heat. 



CHAPTER III. 

CORDOVA. 

We all leave Madrid in an evening train bound 
for Cordova. The Spaniards told Mr. Reinhart 
that the sleeping-car was one of the compensa- 
tions which America had given them in return 
for what America owed to Christopher Colum- 
bus. For my part, I never succeeded in enter- 
ing a sleeping-car in Spain, — they call them 
wagons-lits. I do not know why my luck was so 
bad ; but I suppose I was as modest and shy as 
some English friends of mine who travelled a 
thousand or two miles in America last autumn 
on first-class trains, before they discovered the 
existence even of the parlor-cars, which were on 
every one of those trains. Shrinking people 
like me sometimes suffer from their modesty. 
But because we were dressed and sitting upright 
at midnight, or a little later, we had an adven- 
ture at Alcazar. This adventure is described by 
all Spanish travellers ; and no wonder. Some- 
where between twelve and one the train stopped 
to pass the night train for the northward, all 



CORDOVA. 41 

these roads being of a single track. You have 
half an hour to stop when you have finished 
your first nap, and when you are told there is 
refreshment at the Fonda, you naturally tumble 
out. 

Note that Fonda is the wreck of the Latin 
word Fundus, a farm, though it now always 
means a tavern or a restaurant. Note the his- 
tory in civilization implied in this change in the 
meaning of the word. One can easily enough 
see that in Texas to-day, or in the Indian Ter- 
ritory, a man riding about after his cattle or 
sheep, if he wanted cooked food, would go to 
the first farm-house. So it is that, in the long 
run in such a country, farm-house stands for 
" eating-house." Into the Fonda we went. Two 
or three long tables were set all ready. At each 
seat was a bowl of hot chocolate paste. Paste 
it should be called, though you could pour it, 
if you chose, from bowl to bowl. They say a 
spoon will stand in Spanish chocolate. This is 
not quite true ; but a crust of bread or a long 
slice of cake will stand erect in it and not fall 
to the side of the cup. By the side of each 
bowl of chocolate was a large fresh sponge- 
cake, still on the sheet of white paper on which 
it had been baked. It was just what we call a 
" Naples biscuit," only a great deal nicer than 
our confectioners generally choose to make, 



42 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

and a great deal larger. You break up this 
sponge-cake in bits, dip the chocolate with it, 
and eat So nicely are the two adjusted to each 
other, that when you have done the cake you 
have also finished the chocolate. You are now 
ready to go to sleep again ; and for one, I wish 
that any other form of civilization known to me 
would give me such a repast in the middle of 
every night just after my first nap. 

Just then it is, as you leave the table and pay 
your modest scot, that a brigand-looking man, 
with a sash a foot wide around his waist stuck 
full of knives and daggers, cries out " Cuchillos 
para matar, Cuchillos para inatar" This means 
" knives for murder." In fact, all his things 
could be used for this purpose, if, as old Charles 
Pinkney says, your principles did not stand in 
the way. Ours did ; but all the same we bought 
a good many of the knives, and at this moment 
one lies in its purple sheath by this writing-desk 
ready to do the modest work of a paper-cutter. 

Alcazar means the Ccesar, originally. So it 
came around to mean the Palace, and I fancy 
it is as frequent a word in Spain as Kingston 
might be in America. At any rate, I find three 
" Alcazars " as the names of towns in a some- 
what limited index in Murray. They still keep 
up at this Alcazar some little iron-works, of 
which the fruits were thus sold to us. I am 



CORDOVA. 43 

told that the Spaniards can still make as good 
cutlery as they could in the days of the best 
Toledo blades. As I have or have not said 
already, its distinction as a metallurgic country 
was what first interested eastern or civilized 
Europe in Spain. The quality of the specular 
iron-ore was very good, and this ore is not yet 
exhausted. To the great grief of the English 
free-traders, they insist upon keeping up a stiff 
protective tariff; and so we bought our little 
knives cheaply enough, as it seemed to me, 
very likely from the man that made them. But 
I believe that on theory he ought to have been 
doing nothing eleven months in the year, while 
the crop of Esparto grass was growing wild; 
that he should then have sent this to England 
for sale, and should have been paid for it in 
some knives made at Sheffield, which he should 
then have offered to me at Alcazar. But, in 
point of fact, I should not then have bought the 
knife. 

Sure that we could defend ourselves now if 
we were attacked by train wreckers, as we were 
not, we slept tranquilly enough until morn- 
ing. I am sorry and ashamed to say that in 
this unromantic way we passed all through 
La Mancha, 1 the country of Don Quixote and 
dear Sancho Panza, and I am sorry to add that 

1 Which means, they say, " a spot ; " that is, a blot. 



44 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

I did the same thing on my return northward 
some weeks after. It would have been so much 
better every way to have jumbled along on four 
little jackasses, with our baggage in alforcas 
and our rations in haversacks and canteens. 
By the way, canteen is a Spanish word from 
cantina. A great many of our maritime and 
our military words have, like this, a Spanish 
origin. 

But I am sorry to say that I did not find any- 
where any popular traces or reminiscences of 
dear Don Quixote or Sancho. And I should 
think that other recent travellers have had the 
same experience. I found a fairly intelligent 
courier, who had been for twenty years taking 
travelling parties all over Spain, who did not 
know what I meant when I talked of La Mancha 
and of its two great heroes. 

Don Quixote was for sale in every book- 
store, and in good modern editions. But, in 
nearly two months, it did not happen to me to 
hear any person allude to the Don or to the squire, 
unless I led the conversation that way. And I 
do not think that in the very piquant rattle of 
the daily newspapers with which Spain is flooded 
I ever saw any reference to either of them. 
Nor, indeed, should I think the Spanish espe- 
cially fond of proverbs. I know perfectly well 
that a traveller might spend six weeks in the 



CORDOVA. 45 

United States without hearing any one speak of 
George Washington or Benjamin Franklin. But 
I do not mean to compare these heroes with the 
Don and with Sancho. 

The reader of Don Quixote, if he choose to 
follow us, will see that we crossed the Don's 
path once and again in Andalusia and in other 
parts of Spain. It is simply of La Mancha that 
I " confess ignorance." 

With the morning light, it was clear enough 
that we had made one of those charming con- 
trasts which are the special gifts of modern con- 
veyance. I left New England once, when there 
was good sleighing, took a steamer for Charles- 
ton, and landed there to find the girls bringing 
in great baskets full of roses from the gardens. 
I left a hard-coal fire at Louisville once, to come 
out for my next stay at New Orleans, with the 
oranges of one year still on the trees side by 
side with the orange blossoms of the next. 
Such are among the minor comforts of steam. 

We were now in the valley of the Guadal- 
quivir, the Baetis. Guadalquivir is a corrup- 
tion from the Arabic Wada-1-Kebir, or " the Great 
River." Old Latin-school boys will sympathize 
with me when I say that I have always had a 
grudge against this river, because it chose to 
have its accusative in im and its ablative in i. 
This idiosyncrasy of the river gave me much care 



46 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

and trouble in my day, not to speak of thousands 
of my fellow-pupils and of my masters. For it- 
self, the poor river was perhaps unconscious of its 
accusative; and a very charming river it is. It 
waters a very charming valley, for in southern 
Spain, when you say " water," you mean oranges 
and lemons and figs and olives and oil and 
grapes and raisins and wine and apricots and 
strawberries and roses and lilies and heliotropes 
and wheat and barley and oats and grass and 
clover and alfalfa, and everything else which 
will delight the heart of man or make his face to 
shine. You begin to see bayonet palms, possi- 
bly bananas, Mexican agaves, prickly pears, with 
pecan-trees and other trees which remind you 
of Mexico and Louisiana. 

All this is the result of irrigation. It is to 
irrigation, and to irrigation only, that you owe it 
that Spain is spoken of as a country so fertile. 
At the same time, as most readers will remem- 
ber, you never read of Spain but people call it 
" arid." The truth is, that you may have almost 
everything in the way of water supply in one 
part of Spain or in another. The annual rain- 
fall in Madrid is but twelve inches, and the rain- 
fall for six months of summer is but five. But 
the annual rainfall in Seville is twenty-three 
inches, while the summer rainfall is hardly 
larger than that of Madrid. In parts of Spain, 



CORDOVA. 47 

as in La Mancha, there have been periods of five 
years without a drop of rain. On the other 
hand, in Granada, where they have the advan- 
tage of the high Sierra Nevada, the average rain- 
fall is thirty-two inches. Their problem, then, is 
to spread their water " where it will do the most 
good." It must not rush through torrents to 
the sea, but must be caught at every corner, and 
made to distil gently over fertile lowlands, which 
would else be dry. This they do by their very 
simple irrigation works. In all Spain there are 
374,000 acres irrigated in this way. It seems 
very little ; it is only eighteen old Maine town- 
ships of six miles square. But if you put it in 
wheat only, at fifty bushels an acre, you would 
have nearly two millions of bushels, which is the 
annual bread supply of four hundred thousand 
men. In point of fact, you do not put it in 
wheat very largely. You put it in wine, oil, 
raisins, figs, and other such fancy crops, if you 
may call them so, which will sell for a great deal 
more than fifty bushels of wheat for an acre. 

I had seen in Colorado their irrigation works, 
where they are introducing the same system. 
Oddly enough, they learn how to do it from 
Spaniards, whose ancestors learned in this very 
Andalusia, or in many cases from my friends the 
Pueblo Indians, who irrigated, I believe, before 
the Spaniards taught them how. I should like 



48 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

to see some township in Berkshire or Hampden 
try the experiment along six or eight miles of 
that brawling Westfield River. You would dam 
it from point to point, so that the head should 
be nowhere dangerously high, and then you 
would lead a zigzag ditch for irrigation, falling 
perhaps a foot in a mile, or even less, wherever 
the slope of the hill might lead you. There 
would have to be some common law regulating 
the water-rights of the several meadow proprie- 
tors. You see that the original investment is 
not severe. And when you compare the results 
of steady, even moisture against the results 
given by the average of one of our fitful sum- 
mers, the gain of the crop is enormous. 

Anybody who will read Amicis's amusing ac- 
count of his visit to Cordova, or Theophile Gau- 
tier's, will have reason to expect, even from 
people as unromantic as we are, something en- 
tirely out of the range of the nineteenth century 
now we come into Cordova. But I will not 
abuse this reader by inventing black-eyed Moor- 
ish houris, as I am afraid both these writers do. 
There ought to be enough in the square truth, 
if one could only get on paper the impression 
which the first Moorish city he has ever seen 
makes upon him. 

Cordova had been an important city in Caesars 
time. There were people enough in it then for 



CORDOVA. 49 

Caesar to kill twenty-eight thousand of them by- 
way of punishment for their adherence to Pom- 
pey. Of this Roman occupation you see signs 
to this hour. But, as the city stands, it dates 
from the Moorish times; it declared its inde- 
pendence in 756, and became the capital of the 
Moorish empire of Spain. In the tenth century 
three hundred thousand people lived here. 
They had fifty hospitals, which is, I suppose, 
twenty-five more than the three hundred and 
fifty thousand people of Boston have, and in 
one library they had six hundred thousand vol- 
umes, which is twice as many as the three hun- 
dred and fifty thousand people of Boston have 
in their Public Library to-day. 

What interests me more than these figures — 
which could probably be stretched backward or 
forward to mean much what you choose — is the 
suggestion one gets as to the wise Moorish ad- 
ministration, especially in public education and 
in the relief of the poor. One of these Moorish 
kings, I forget his name, did on a large scale 
what Rumford did on a small scale in Bavaria. 
That is to say, this Paynim hound, this unbap- 
tized Saracen, set on foot a bureau of industry 
which was also an industrial school, at which he 
compelled the attendance of all his tramps, 
" wayside-lodge people," and other gentry who 
had no " visible means of support." He had 

4 



50 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

none of the nonsense of Monsieur Marie's national 
workshops. He did not dream of competing 
with the regular labor market. But he kept on 
hand a series of public works which need not be 
done, but which it was well to do ; and, year by- 
year, these things dragged along and eventually 
got themselves done by the assistance of these 
tramps, who were no longer kept alive by Mos- 
lem good-nature at the expense of Moslem grit 
and muscle, without showing anything for their 
work. Our system is to give soup for nothing 
to anybody who will ask for it, if only he be 
clear, sheer beggar enough to look forlorn, and 
have lost his manliness enough to make applica- 
tion. But we take care not to make him work 
when he comes for it. And if anybody pro- 
poses to teach the tramps how to work at the 
public charge, or to make them work in the 
public works, the city solicitor says that the first 
is against the law, and the park commissioners 
say that the other would be sentimental and not 
business-like. 

In the tenth century, Cordova was a far finer 
city than Rome or Constantinople or any other 
city in Europe. The Saracen power was so 
vast, that the Caliph and other princes sent to 
Abdu-r-rhaman (the slave of consolation) mar- 
bles, and especially marble columns, from all 
parts of the world which they had conquered. 



CORDOVA. 51 

This gave him eighteen hundred marble pillars, 
and he seems to have founded the idea, any- 
way he carried it out, of building a sort of 
palm-grove, by using them, so to speak, for the 
trunks of the trees. As all the pillars were 
not of the same height, they sometimes had 
more and sometimes less work and height to 
the capitals. Some are of one color, and some 
of another. Then he had at each end eighteen 
doors, and he had the whole a good deal open 
to the sky. So in every direction there were 
lovely vistas, which looked like the vistas in the 
tall palm-groves that he was used to in some 
other land. 

This is, at least, the way which all travellers 
choose to describe the Great Mosque of Cor- 
dova. So I think there must be something in 
the story of his intending an imitation of a 
grove. The mosque, now a cathedral, is not 
very high. But it is high enough to give you 
the sense and sentiment of a forest, and the 
vastness in each direction carries out that feel- 
ing. After the Conquest, some wretched local 
authorities — bishop and chapter, I guess — put 
their heads together, as if they had had a wood- 
paving job on their conscience, and proposed to 
build one of the Spanish ' choirs ' just in the 
middle of this marble forest. Of course it 
would, by so much as its space covered, break 



52 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

the magnificent vistas. Somebody had the sense 
to protest. And the question was referred to 
Charles the Fifth, whose duties in ruining civili- 
zation elsewhere kept him away from Spain a 
good deal. He did as such gentry do, — sus- 
tained the constituted authorities. And so this 
great choir was built, as you might cut down 
sixty or eighty trees in the middle of a forest 
on Mattawamkeag to build a meeting-house in 
the approved architecture of Maine in the nine- 
teenth century. When Charles came to Cor- 
dova, at last, and the admiring choir-builders 
showed to him their work, their emperor said to 
them : " What you have built could have been 
built anywhere. But you have destroyed what 
was more grand than anything left on earth. M 
I am sorry to say that it did not occur to him 
that it was he who did the destroying. 

Around the mosque of Cordova is a dead 
white wall. It might be a prison. You go in by 
a little gate, and you are in a green orchard of 
orange-trees. Then by another doorway you 
enter the mosque, and the forest of marble 
which I have tried to describe is before you. In 
the endless variety, in the change which every 
inch of movement makes in the perspective and 
the vistas, it is not hard to persuade yourself 
that you hear the wind, as you might do in a 
forest at home. 



CORDOVA. S3 

Our guide was a Moresco, who was, I think, 
the lineal descendant of Haroun himself, and he 
was much pleased with our acquaintance, derived 
from the Arabian Nights, with the customs and 
faith of his ancestry. We made him read the 
Arabic words over the magnificent pulpit built by 
the Slave of Consolation. And he read : " Allah 
alone is great. Blessed be the name of Allah. 
There is no strength or power but in Allah. " 
It was exactly like our dear Lane. 

It may assist the reader, as he follows us into 
the Moorish part of Spain, to know that the 
writer brings up his own family on a regular 
course of the Arabian Nights' Entertainment. 
Their household not only contains the original in 
the text of Cairo, for any wandering fakir to 
read aloud from, but copies of every well-re- 
puted version. And when better times come, 
and a competitive examination in the Arabian 
Nights is prescribed for candidates in the art of 
living well, the members of this household hope 
they shall not be found wanting. 1 

After we had seen the mosque, they took us 
to the garden of the Alcazar, the old Moorish 
sachem. It is just like the Arabian Nights, 

1 Not to boast, but to state a fact of literature, I believe that 
the version of the first story of the Arabian Nights, pub- 
lished by me in "Crusoe in New York," p. 595, is the fullest 
version in English ever printed of any of those stories. 



54 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

with carp-ponds and streams of water ; roses in 
full bloom, and pomegranates, palm-trees, and 
so on; figs not quite ripe, and nespolas, which 
were. Thence we all went into one of the Alca- 
zar's towers by the river-side, and made a draw- 
ing of a bridge of which Augustus Caesar made 
the piers, we sitting under the grape-blossoms of 
a vine. 

Another garden, not on the guide-books, had 
another charm. At the hotel, at dinner, a gen- 
tleman who was at table d'hote with his wife 
had been instructing me in the art of eating 
strawberries. I had thought this came of nature. 
But this was my mistake. When you are in 
Spain, where oranges and strawberries are ripe 
together, you avail yourself of what the astrono- 
mers would call the synchronous period, and eat 
them together. You fill a plate with what we 
should call a quarter-box of berries. You cover 
them with white sugar. You cut a perfectly ripe 
orange, and squeeze the juice all over berries and 
sugar. You then take a spoon and eat. This 
gentleman, in the courtesy of the country, ex- 
plained to us the process, but said we should eat 
the fruit fresh from the vines and the trees, and, 
that we might do so, asked us all to his garden 
when our sight-seeing might be over. Thither, 
accordingly, we repaired, and he kindly showed 
to me all the dainty irrigation processes of 



CORDOVA. 55 

gardening; he and his pleasant wife loaded 
the ladies with flowers, and we ate strawberries 
as one might do in Waterville in New Hamp- 
shire, if only its hemlock forests were orange 
groves. 



CHAPTER IV. 

SEVILLE. 

After being a week in Spain, I wrote in Se- 
ville that " I am yet to see the first flea. I do not 
know the taste of garlic ; and for oil, I only 
know it in the sweetest form on the most ex- 
quisite lettuce. I am living in a hotel here, 
equal to the best we saw in Europe, where I pay 
two dollars a day for everything. What the 
inconveniences are of Spanish travel we have 
yet to discover. On the other hand, everything 
is curious and entertaining. 

" The people are charming. When we are 
ready to come here, we will hire for a trifle some 
old palace, built around a court, with lions and 
fountains and orange-trees, with a fig-tree or two 
growing up by accident. We will spend our 
days in the gardens of the Alcazar. That at 
Cordova was but ill maintained by a gardener 
who turned an honest penny by selling lettuce 
and cabbages. This is maintained by the State. 
They show you the orange-tree that Peter the 
Cruel planted ; you are tempted to try the Sul- 



SEVILLE. 57 

tana's bath, and you vote Charles the Fifth's 
summer house to be the one successful summer 
home in the world. It is in as perfect condition 
as when he left it. The walls, inside and out, are 
carved with beautiful enamelled tiles. Griffins, 
lions, satyrs, unicorns, pillars of Hercules, castles 
of Castile, appear mixed up in quaint confusion ; 
the tile-makers not working by a stencil pat- 
tern, but as their fancy dictated, and the tiles, 
for the most part, as fresh as if you bought the 
best Minton tiles yesterday, and far brighter in 
color. The ceiling is of carved mahogany, which 
I suppose the virgin forests of San Domingo 
furnished." 

People talk of the old Italian style of garden- 
ing; and the reader perhaps remembers the 
gardening of the Borromean Islands. But this 
is more to my taste. In the first place, there is 
absolute seclusion. The palace shields it on 
one or two sides ; on the others a wall, like the 
State-prison wall at Charlestown. You see at 
once how a lover imprisoned in such a garden 
could not escape if his courage cooled. Then 
this space is cut up more or less by high and 
thick walls, on both sides of which orange-trees 
are trained, en espalier. But the main object is 
shade, so desirable in a hot climate. 

As we plant on the south side of a wall, they 
would often plant on the east, or even the north. 



58 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

All these walks, however, are completely masked 
by oranges or other hedges ; and so large are 
the arches, and so crafty the other vistas, that 
you have no feeling of being shut up in court- 
yards. Your paths, however, are not gravel, but 
tiles, evidently enamelled in the Moors' days, 
for pieces of the enamelled work still appear; 
indeed, some of the old walks are well pre- 
served. The beds are perhaps a foot lower than 
the walks, always bordered with box, laurustinus, 
oranges, lemons, or some such evergreen, care- 
fully trimmed, and perhaps eighteen inches high 
and thick. The object of all this arrangement 
is irrigation ; for all the tiles are underlaid with 
pipes, and there are frequent holes. When, 
therefore, the gardener needs, water is turned on 
the pipes, the tiles are suffused with it, it runs 
off upon the beds, and your flowers have the 
comfort of moisture without watering pot or en- 
gine. Meanwhile, judging from to-day, you can 
command shade or draught much as you choose ; 
and one understands the love of the Moors for 
gardens, and the part they play so often in the 
Arabian Nights. 

I think a man who should live in Seville a 
month would understand better than Walter 
Scott did how men went and came in Europe in 
the times of Richard and Philip, and how they 
lived in Lyons in the days of Peter Waldo. 



SEVILLE. 59 

Streets narrow as Tom Kelly's alley, in which 
a donkey may only go in a certain fixed di- 
rection, because he could not pass another 
donkey, are the very streets from which you 
enter a court-yard blazing with exotic flowers 
from all the modern world, from which court- 
yard open the rooms of a palace, with all the 
splendors of a palace. Our hotel fronted on the 
principal street of the town. There is not left 
at the North End of Boston a street so narrow. 
Large curtains hang across it at the top, to 
screen the upper rooms from the sun. It is 
crowded with little shops not bigger than your 
china closet. And in one of those shops you 
shall find Renan's books side by side with 
The Imitation of Christ; in the next shall be 
Singer's sewing-machine ; and in the next a 
cobbler making a sandal like that worn by the 
Romans. You step into one of these shops to 
avoid a jackass laden with bales of hay brought 
in from the country to feed the horses who 
dragged you from the railroad. 

This is what I mean when I say every step is a 
romance. Travel has not spoiled it, nor begun 
to spoil it. The people are as simple as they 
were in the days of Columbus. 

I wanted, if I could, to buy some old books 
one day, and was told that there was a certain 
fair held every Thursday where I could perhaps 



60 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

pick up what I needed. So I went to this fair, 
which is of second-hand articles wholly, and it 
was precisely like the Arabian Nights. The 
streets in that precinct are wholly given up to it 
on Thursday, and no carriages are permitted on 
that day. So the dealers lay out their articles 
on the street itself, which is well paved, without 
sidewalks, in granite blocks. A path some six 
feet wide is left for passing, and, as the street is 
wider or narrower, the salesmen have more or 
less space. Where the streets are wide, the 
crockery-men establish themselves ; so you see 
plates, mugs, cups, &c, all nominally second- 
hand, arrayed on the street. 

You see readily how, if a jackass strays in by 
any accident, just one of those tragedies takes 
place, with the crockery, that occur more than 
once in the Arabian Nights. As many of the 
people are Moors, as all are in the costume of 
people in operas, as the articles sold are the 
most ramshackled old bits that have been left 
since the Ark, you can imagine that the whole 
is sufficiently oriental 

We were taken to see a palace which has been 
kept in perfect order since the days of the 
Moors, and is now just as it might be if Haroun 
Alraschid lived in it. I really never conceived 
anything so beautiful. I have tried to describe 
the system of inner court-yards. We came to 



SEVILLE. 6 1 

this house through a narrow whitewashed street, 
which promised nothing. But the court-yard, 
or entrance to it, was white marble, and was 
screened at the inner end by a gate. 

The attendant admitted us, however, and here 
was a lovely square garden of oriental and trop- 
ical plants, palms, bananas, and brilliant flower- 
ing shrubs. Around this the house is built, a 
corridor of exquisite white marble arches wholly 
surrounding the square. All these arches are 
adorned with that delicate carving which we 
associate with the Alhambra, and which looks 
like ivory-work. It is finely cut in stucco. 
Each story above has one of these corridors. 
We were not permitted to go upstairs ; but the 
stairway was of elegant white marble also, rising 
up to a lofty dome, carved and highly orna- 
mented. In another garden without was the 
invariable fish-tank, which is the water supply of 
the whole. 

To go back to my analysis of the charm of 
Seville, you are in the midst of people who 
seem, at least, to know how to enjoy themselves. 
At night the principal streets and squares are 
filled with men and women, straying here and 
there, absolutely with no purpose but to enjoy 
starlight, moonlight, and open air. Enormous 
cafes, of a size which would astonish Boston and 
New York, even were they devoted to whiskey 



62 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

or billiards, are filled with men and women sip- 
ping lemonade or sugared water, and talking 
with animation, like a great evening party, pro- 
vided for every one at the cost of the half-cent 
for his sugar. 

I had always held to Miss Ferrier's bright rule 
in travelling, that a visit should be three days 
long, — " the rest day, the dressed day, and the 
pressed day." I have told hundreds of young 
travellers that it is better to spend three days in 
one place, than one day each in three. And cer- 
tainly, in my plans, I had no thought of spending 
more than three days in Seville. We wanted to 
see Murillo's pictures in his home, and I wanted 
to see some papers in the archives. I supposed 
three days would be enough, and, as I have said 
in the preface to these notes, I had been ex- 
horted by all the prudent tribes not to linger in 
the south of Spain in May or June. But when 
you are once established in Seville, things im- 
press you very differently. 

True to the theory of taking a Spanish hotel, 
1 if I could find one, rather than one which af- 
fected to be French, I went to the Europa. The 
place, or a part of it, was once a convent, and at 
the back of the beautiful patio a magnificent 
staircase of the convent times — excellent to sit 
on in the shade of the afternoon — takes you up 
to the second floor, where the bedrooms are. 



SEVILLE. 63 

All this stairway is hung with sacred pictures, 
which may or may not have been there in con- 
vent days ; certainly they make the place seem 
very different from a hotel, as we think of one. 
You can, if you choose, — and you are apt to 
choose, — have your coffee or chocolate served 
under the shade of a banana-tree, in the sound 
of the fountain, at the side of the patio. 

Once installed in such a place, dropping into 
the habit of a siesta in the hour which would be 
hot out of doors ; with palaces, gardens, galleries, 
churches, at hand, such as your best dreams 
never painted ; with excursions possible in any 
direction of curious interest; with daily life a 
queer reminder of the Arabian Nights literally 
at every step, you no longer think of going 
away in three days. You only inquire why you 
should go away at all. What are you for? Why 
are you in Spain? Did you come to Spain to 
enjoy some pleasant weeks? Well! what can 
you find more charming than this? Have you 
exhausted it? With every day you feel that you 
are only beginning to take it in. 

The local proverb says, " See Seville and die." 
One would not wish to die merely because he 
had seen it. A better proverb would be, " See 
Seville and live there." There is just this strong 
infusion of Eastern habit which makes it so 
attractive to us crude Westerns : there is a cli- 



64 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

mate well nigh perfect; there is the activity, 
agreeable, after all, of a business town in full and 
easy relations with the rest of the world ; and, 
last of all, Seville has an advantage, which many 
of us, of what I call the literary class, appreciate, 
living is very, very cheap. I heard of some in- 
telligent people living there very much as I live 
at home, I fancy, whose full daily charge aver- 
aged forty-two cents a day for each of them. 
This was life in a palace, where the family kept 
house comfortably. They had American tastes, 
and seemed to enjoy them. I tell this with terror, 
lest I send half unoccupied America to Seville. 
For I am old enough to remember when we 
could live at the same charge in North Conway 
in summer. I have sometimes feared that I, 
and my friend who made this discovery, an- 
nounced it too freely to an eager world. 

" Happy is the country whose history is un- 
written. " If we feel that in America, day by 
day, when one's newspapers come to us " without 
a word in them," what shall we say in Seville, 
where the newspapers are so much smaller? 
But they make up in number. Spain is just in 
that first phase of liberty when everybody wants 
to write in a newspaper, and every one thinks 
he can publish one. They have very many 
comic papers. Every considerable city seems 
to have its own ; and these, with their brilliant 



SEVILLE. 6$ 

colored cartoons, circulate in all the other cities. 
They are generally published weekly; but there 
are so many of these papers, that with almost 
every day a new one is exhibited. Some of 
them are very funny; some, to a foreigner, quite 
unintelligible. There is at least one literary 
journal here, and I saw a good many recent 
books by Sevillian authors. One of the folk-lore 
societies is represented which have been estab- 
lished in many parts of Europe for preserving 
local traditions and a knowledge of local litera- 
ture. The centre of these societies is in London. 
Near the doorway of our hotel, among the other 
caricatures, there hung one of the Saviour, which 
would not have been tolerated an hour at any 
shop-door in Boston. So much for the working 
of the Inquisition, in the long run, for the sup- 
pression of blasphemy or heresy. 

Americans would be apt to go to the Colum- 
bian Library, founded by the son of Christopher 
Columbus. A magnificent building enshrines it, 
and one does not see any collection more elegant 
in the outward appurtenance of a library. But 
you are disappointed if you expect to find me- 
morials of the discoverer. They do show, under 
glass, a copy of Ptolemy, I think, with notes by 
him, and an old map with three caravels drawn 
near islands, which you try to think are the 
three vessels of discovery. Let me, as I pass, 

5 



66 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

warn other travellers not to expect to see the 
documents in the archives without a permit from 
Madrid. I found a gentleman from Guatemala 
at work there, and was not surprised to find it 
supposed that his business and mine were the 
same, as, in a certain sense, they were. 

The exterior view of the cathedral gives no 
idea of its grandeur or beauty. As in all the 
Spanish cathedrals which I saw, the choir is built 
in the middle, almost as a separate church. 
And, as at Burgos, this hurts the vista of the 
nave. But you cannot spoil so magnificent a 
building. I do not know, and do not care to 
look to see, how long the aisles are or how 
high ; they are long enough and high enough to 
create and to preserve that sense of wonder, awe, 
and satisfied rest for which cathedrals were built 
and stand. Looking over these notes, now far 
away from Seville, I find that the curiosities 
which the eager guide showed there, as in all 
such places, do not come back to me as having 
any connection with the cathedral itself. They 
are so many side shows, to use a very happy 
expression of the vernacular. They are a nui- 
sance at the time; but afterwards they do not 
annoy you. 

One does not count among them the admira- 
ble pictures. Among these is the Vision of St. 
Anthony, which is one of the finest of the Mu- 



SEVILLE. 67 

rillos. It was from this painting that the kneel- 
ing figure of the saint was cut a few years since 
and sent to New York for sale. The New York 
police proved quick enough for the occasion, and 
the New York law strong enough. The thieves 
were caught and the picture restored. They 
show you, in the fit light, the seams which indi- 
cate the patch of the restored canvas. 

Seville is now a centre of literature and art, 
and must be a very agreeable home. It is said 
that the social circles are accomplished and 
agreeable. The museum is not large, but very 
rich, particularly in pictures by Murillo, and here 
we saw for the first time the work of Alonzo 
Cano. The art school calls together quite a 
large number of young artists. It was to the 
enthusiasm of some of them that the riots were 
due, if indeed they deserve that name, which 
gave one subject to the newspapers aside from 
the eternal discussion of Madrid politics, while 
we were there. On one of the last days of May 
was celebrated the second centennial anniversary 
of the death of Murillo. In point of fact he died 
on the 3d of April, 1682; but they took some 
festival in May, I now forget what, for the cele- 
bration. Now, in honor of Murillo's exquisite 
pictures of the Virgin, it seems that somebody 
had called him " The Painter of the Immaculate 
Conception. " The dogma of the immaculate 



68 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

conception — for it has been a dogma now for a 
quarter of a century — is, or has been, the passion 
of the Roman Catholic Church in our time. Se- 
ville having been the birthplace of Murillo, some 
enthusiastic priests thought this would be a good 
opportunity for a solemnity at once in his honor 
and that of the Virgin. They certainly gave fair 
notice of what they were going to do. I saw, some 
weeks before, in France, a public notice that they 
had invited some churches, even so far off, to lend 
their banners to be used in the procession. This 
is not a bad way to invoke general sympathy. 
As the Queen, if she cannot go to a funeral, sends 
her carriage, so if a church cannot send a priest to 
a procession, it can send a banner, if it has one 
to send. But this ecclesiastical view of the occa- 
sion did not please the art students, and it would 
seem that they rallied to their side the other 
students of the university. They said that they 
were as ready to celebrate Murillo's birthday as 
anybody, but they were not going to have it 
mixed up with the Roman Catholic Church or 
its dogmas. As soon, therefore, as the proces- 
sion appeared in the street, the priests, who seem 
to have made the greater part of it, were hooted 
and hustled, not to say stoned. And they, with 
their banners, were obliged to take rapid flight, 
and finally to seek refuge in a church. I do not 
know, and I could not find anybody who thought 



SEVILLE. 69 

he knew, whether the people at large showed 
more sympathy with the attack or the defence. 
Extreme clerical papers were very angry, and 
extreme radical papers were very angry, each 
from their own point of view. Between the ex- 
tremes, most of the journals were undertaking to 
show that it was a matter of no great conse- 
quence, and I rather think they were right. But 
I believe it is true that the troops were ordered 
out to preserve order. All this happened a day 
or two before I came to Seville. 

For two or three days after, however, every 
morning's paper announced that the disturbances 
had been renewed, the night before, by bands of 
students passing through the city, singing and 
shouting and in conflict with the police. Indeed, 
if you had read the Madrid papers, you would 
have thought we were in a state of siege. But 
I tell this whole story to illustrate exaggera- 
tion in a country wild for newspapers, where 
there is very little news. It was then May, and 
the weather lovely. I was in the streets and 
squares every evening, in the very streets where 
these things were said to take place, and yet I 
never saw myself or heard any of the incidents 
of the affair. I said so one day to an intelligent 
man, who replied rather vehemently, " You 
should have been in the Plaza del Duque at nine 
o'clock last night." I asked if he were there. 



70 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

No, he was not there, but there was a collision 
between the students and the troops, and a large 
number of students were carried to the guard- 
house. Now, in fact, I was sitting with a party 
of ladies on a seat in that Plaza, from half-past 
eight to quarter-past nine, and we spent all the 
rest of the evening at the theatre hard by. We 
heard no noise, and saw no collision. It is my 
belief that there was none. But there was a 
good deal of newspaper excitement, and the de- 
termination in each office to make the most of 
whatever did occur. The bishop of the diocese 
made a semi-official statement that the Murillo 
demonstration was none of his business. It was 
even said that he transferred the priests who 
were implicated to other fields of duty, in such 
a way that it was supposed that the transfer 
was a reprimand. On the other hand, when, a 
few weeks after, the Commencement Day, or 
whatever corresponds to it, came round, the 
government refused to give degrees to the stu- 
dents who were engaged in the riot. Thus a 
certain Gallio-like indifference was maintained 
by the authorities in regard to the battle itself. 
It is not the first time in my life that I have 
been in the midst of a conflict which attracted 
much more attention at a distance than it gained 
from the lookers-on. 



CHAPTER V. 

PALOS AND COLUMBUS. 

MOST American school-boys and school-girls 
know that Columbus sailed from " Palos in 
Spain " to discover America. Some of them 
know that he sailed on the 3d of August, 1492. 

When they grow to be men and women, if 
they look for Palos on a good enough map 
they will not find it. It will be on some purely 
American-manufacture maps. But it will not 
be on the average map. I was in the cabinet of 
one of the first geographers in the world, and he 
took down an excellent map of Spain, on a large 
scale, authenticated by an official board, and 
there was no Palos there. 

I had determined to see Palos. And Seville 
is the point of departure for this excursion. 
On a lovely May day we started, — my daughter 
and I. There is a railway, sufficiently good, 
built chiefly or wholly by a mining company, 
which comes from the valley of the Guadal- 
quivir to that of the Tinto, and takes you there. 
It is a pleasant ride of sixty-five miles or there- 
abouts. 



J 2 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The ride seems tropical to us who have never 
been in the tropics. Orange-trees, fig-trees, 
olive-trees, and vineyards just pushing out 
their fresh green leaves, fill the fertile grounds 
of these valleys. And how hard the people 
do work ! I have never seen anywhere a set 
of farmers who seemed to stick so to their 
business. 

We fell into talk with a courteous Spanish 
gentleman, who was most eager to explain what 
we did not understand. 

The western sun, low in the horizon, is stream- 
ing through the windows of the carriage. Our 
friend is on the eastern side ; he is looking watch- 
fully across the marshes and the river ; and so, 
as some mound of sand is passed by the train 
and opens a full view to the other side of the 
wide estuary, he raises his hand, points across 
the marshes and says, " Palo ! " 

We were all silent for a moment. I think he 
knew something of my feeling. And I — I 
found I cared for Palos more than I had sup- 
posed possible. I had crossed Spain with the 
intention of seeing the place. But I had not at 
any time pictured to myself the gulf between 
1492 and 1882; nor even asked myself to im- 
agine Columbus and Martin Pinzon at work on 
the equipment of the ships. Of a sudden all 
the features of the contrast presented them- 



PALOS AND COLUMBUS. 73 

selves. Enough, perhaps, that, as we dashed 
on in the comfort of the railway train, we were 
looking across the desolate marshes to the for- 
saken village, where hardly a few white houses 
could be made out, and told ourselves that from 
the enterprise and courage of that place the 
discovery of America became possible. 

The seaport of Palos in the time of Columbus 
was a place so important, that the crew and 
vessels of the first expedition were all gathered 
there, in face of the difficulties which the super- 
stition of the time and the terms of the voyage 
presented. 

I do not suppose it to have been a seaport 
of the first class, but it was a considerable and 
active town. It was on the eastern side of the 
estuary of the Tinto River, a considerable 
stream, known to navigators as far back as the 
first history of navigation. It takes its name 
Tinto from the color which it brings from the 
copper and iron mines above, which are the 
very mines which gave to Spain its interest for 
Phoenician navigators. In nearly four centuries 
since Columbus's time the current of the river 
has been depositing silt in what was then the 
port of Palos, and this port is now entirely filled 
up. With the destruction of the harbor the 
town has gone to ruin. The few white specks 
which my Spanish friend pointed out to me, in 



74 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

the light of the evening sun, marked the place 
of the few houses in which a hundred or two 
poor people are living, w T here were once the 
dock-yards and warehouses of the active town. 
The rival town, Huelva, which was, even in 
Columbus's time, a place of considerable im- 
portance, takes all the commerce of the estuary. 
I think not even a fishing-boat sails from Palos 
itself. 

Huelva is a port where large steamers can lie 
at the pier, and is now a place of active and 
apparently successful trade. 

An English company, which is developing 
the mines, has built a good system of railroads 
which unite Huelva with its mining establish- 
ments, as it built this we had travelled upon 
from Seville. 

There is a new hotel at Huelva, where we 
were comfortably accommodated. I was inter- 
ested to see that all the furniture, which was 
new, was of American manufacture, coming very 
likely from Worcester County, Massachusetts. 
Thus far, at least, we have been able to pay our 
debt to Columbus and to Palos. 

I was wakened the next morning, before five 
o'clock, to hear the singing of birds in a lofty 
orange-tree in the front of my window, that we 
might embark at once on our visit to the con- 
vent of Rabida, and, if possible, to the ruins of 



PALOS AND COLUMBUS. 75 

Palos. A fine half-decked boat, such as we 
might have hired in Marblehead for a like pur- 
pose, with a skipper who looked precisely like 
his Marblehead congener, but with the lateen 
sail which is so curiously characteristic of South- 
ern Europe, was ready for our little voyage. 
We passed heavy steamers which suggested 
little enough of Columbus, but there were fine- 
looking fishing-boats which suggested the plucky 
little Nina of his voyage ; and their seamen are 
probably dressed to-day much as the men who 
landed with him at San Salvador. 

A run of an hour brought us to the fine head- 
land on which the convent of Rabida, or Sta. 
Maria de Rabida, stands, scarcely changed, if 
changed at all, from the aspect it bore on the 
day when Columbus " asked of the porter a 
little bread and water for his child." 1 Lord 
Houghton, following Freiligrath, has sung to us 
how 

" The palm-tree dreameth of the pine, 
The pine-tree of the palm ; " 

and in his delicate imaginings the dream is of 
two continents, ocean-parted, each of whom 
longs for the other. Strange enough, as one 
pushes along the steep ascent from the landing 
at Rabida up the high bluff on which the con- 

1 This is Mr. Everett's language, in a speech which old 
school-boys will remember. 



76 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

vent stands, the palm-tree and the pine grow 
together, as if in token of the dream of the great 
discoverer who was to unite the continents. 

In this convent Columbus made his home 
while the expedition was fitting out ; Palos hard 
by, and quite accessible. Hither the Pinzons 
and the learned physician, Garcia Fernandez, 
were summoned by the good friar Marchena, 
Columbus's steady friend, for the great consul- 
tations from which the discovery grew. 

The convent is a large rambling building, of 
Moorish lines and aspect, built around several 
patios, or gardens. Hardly any windows open 
through the outer walls; but the life of the 
building engages itself in and around the patios 
within. Here cloisters, made by columns with 
arches, surround the pretty enclosures, and in 
these one dines, writes, takes his siesta, or does 
nothing. 

Columbus's room, as a fine chamber upstairs 
is called, has a large table in the middle, on 
w r hich is Columbus's inkstand. All around the 
room there now hang pictures: some of him, 
one of Isabella, one of the good old friar, and 
some by modern painters of different scenes in 
the first great voyage and of his experiences 
after his return. 

The old chapel of the convent is below. It 
is neat and pretty, and worship could be re- 



PA LOS AND COLUMBUS. 77 

newed there at any time. The Duke of Mont- 
pensier, who married a sister of Isabella II. 
the late Queen of Spain, arranged to have it all 
put in proper order. The nation maintains the 
place, and a charming family of Spaniards, 
grandfather, grandmother, son, daughter, and 
three nice boys, Christopher, Immanuel, and 
Joseph, keep it in order. 

The Spanish historians now think that Colum- 
bus came to Rabida with the very purpose of 
interesting Marchena, the good friar. Marchena 
was interested, and recommended him to the 
Bishop of Talavera. But, alas ! he thought Co- 
lumbus was a madman. King and queen alike 
were occupied in fighting the Moors. The 
council of wise men at Salamanca, to whom 
Columbus's plans were referred, decided un- 
favorably. Columbus did receive some favor- 
able messages from France. Wholly discouraged 
in Spain, six years after his first visit here he 
came again, — from Cordoba this time, where 
were the relations of his wife and of his son Diego. 
He came to say that, as Spain had given him up, 
he should give Spain up, and see if the King of 
France would not fit out the expedition. 

The good friar Marchena was dismayed at 
this. He could not bear to have the glory lost 
to Spain. He sent for Garcia Fernandez, a 
doctor in Palos, who had been interested when 



78 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

Columbus was here before. He sent for Pinzon, 
a rich merchant of Palos. They all talked it 
over again, and the friar wrote to the Queen this 
time, not to any bishop. The Queen sent back 
word that Columbus was to come himself and 
explain his plan ; and the sadness of the con- 
vent was changed to joy. 

Columbus's mule was saddled at once. He 
started that night for Santa Fe, and had an au- 
dience from Isabella. She heard and believed. 
She promised her support, and Columbus wrote 
this letter to the brother here at the convent : — 

" Our Lord God has heard the prayers of his 
servants. The wise and virtuous Isabel, touched 
by the grace of Heaven, has kindly listened to 
this poor man's words. All has turned out well. 
I have read to them our plan ; it has been ac- 
cepted, and I have been called to the court to 
state the proper means for carrying out the de- 
signs of Providence. My courage swims in a 
sea of consolation, and my spirit rises in praise 
to God. Come as soon as you can ; the Queen 
looks for you, and I much more than she. I 
commend myself to the prayers of my dear sons, 
and to you. 

" The grace of God be with you, and may our 
Lady of Rabida bless you." 

After a visit full of interest to Rabida, we re- 
turned to our boat, and I directed my seamen to 



PALOS AND COLUMBUS. 79 

take me to some landing whence I could go into 
the very streets of Palos, or what was left of it. 
To my surprise I was told that this was impossi- 
ble. No such landing remains, even for a fish- 
ing-boat of five tons. If the senor wished, it 
would be necessary for the boat to come to an- 
chor, and the senor must be carried on the back 
of the skipper for three-quarters of a mile or 
more, over the flat under water, formed where 
proud ships once rode. The senor declined this 
proposal, and bade the boatman take him to the 
bar of Saltes, the little island in front of Palos 
and Huelva, where Columbus's vessels lay, and 
from which he sailed at eight o'clock on the 
morning of Friday, August 3, 1492. 

The run from Rabida, tacking back and forth 
with a brisk breeze, was perhaps an hour, or a 
little more. The island, which was the last of 
Europe for the great navigator, can be scarcely 
changed. It is a narrow bar high enough to 
break the force of the south and southwest 
winds as they sweep in from the Atlantic, and 
thus make the admirable harbor of Huelva. 

We discharged the grateful duty of collecting 
some memorials of a place so interesting, and 
then, by a rapid run before the wind, returned to 
the pier at Huelva, which is some six miles up 
the river. 



CHAPTER VI. 

XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 

THERE is easy steam navigation from Seville 
to Cadiz, and, according to all accounts, nothing 
is pleasanter than the voyage by steamboat 
down the river. One of Amicis's most amusing 
chapters describes this voyage, and we tried to 
take it. All which I say for the benefit of other 
travellers, for the boats are not advertised ; in- 
deed, you must not, anywhere in Spain, rely upon 
advertising as you would in America. As it 
happened, there was no boat that fitted with our 
plans, and we were obliged to take the rail. The 
ride is of six or seven hours, which we took in 
the afternoon and evening. You pass through 
a highly cultivated valley with such attractions 
as I have tried to describe in speaking of my 
journey to Huelva. 

One of the principal stopping-places is Xeres, 
of which I suppose the geographers would say 
that it is famous for sherry and the Jaleo de 
Xeres. For me, I am no connoisseur in sherry, 



XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 8 1 

but I am old enough to remember Fanny Elssler 
and the Jaleo de Xeres. 

"How sweet when by moonlight the sunbeams retire, 
When with bright burnished silver the waves seem on fire ; 
As the shadows of evening begin to advance, 
How sweet 't is to join in the song and the dance ! 
Not the light-footed naiads that trip o'er the sea 
Are lighter, swifter, gayer than we." 

All such scraps of Spanish song came up to- 
gether from the surges of old memories as we 
saw the sun go down upon the sparkling Guadal- 
quivir, and knew that we need only stop over a 
train to see the Jaleo danced in Xeres itself. 
What we should call the river-bottom was cov- 
ered with rows of young vines, perhaps four feet 
high, in the fresh greenness of leaves which had 
attained half their size. It was like riding in the 
train of the Connecticut River Railroad through 
a growth of young broom-corn. This may be a 
good place to say that I was told by a connois- 
seur, in whose skill I have full confidence, that 
on the spot no man can give more than fifty 
cents a bottle for the best possible pure sherry. 
Whatever we choose to give in addition is what 
we pay for additions, — whether sugar, brandy, or 
other coloring matter. 

As for coloring matter, there is a good deal 
of it ; for the sherry served at the table at Cadiz 
and Malaga is a very light-colored wine. If the 

6 



82 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

length of the passage to America ever made it 
necessary to adulterate pure wine, there can 
hardly be any such necessity now, when the pas- 
sage from Cadiz to New York is made in twelve 
days. But a taste is a taste ; and if connoisseurs 
are used to a mixture of burned sugar, brandy, 
Xeres wine, and water, I suppose they will prefer 
it. So I once found that the average attendant 
on a Boston eating-house preferred to pure milk 
a mixture of milk, water, burned sugar, and salt. 
The keeper of the eating-house likes it better, 
too ; for such a mixture, if there be salt enough, 
can be kept for six days. 

Nobody has ever taken the trouble to tell me 
that Xeres is the modern spelling of Asia regia, 
which was the name of the town in the Roman 
geographies. 

Does the reader remember 

" He stormed the gates of Cadiz, 
And this that gallant Spaniard did 
For me and for the ladies." 

I always had an inward fear that whoever it 
was stormed those gates because " Cadiz " 
rhymes so well with " ladies," and that if it 
had been in another language he might have 
been of another country, say a Frenchman or 
an Italian, to fit the rhyme. But as you pass a 
long salt-marsh, not unlike the Dorchester flats, 
and sweep by long bastions of stone-work, you 



XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 83 

feel that somebody, at some time, has had a 
good deal to do in storming of the gates of Ca- 
diz. And in Irving' s " Conquest of Granada " 
there are places enough where this gallant Span- 
iard can be fitted in. According to Pliny, the 
place was an island in his day, and now this salt- 
marsh parts it from the upland. Our stay in 
Cadiz was of the shortest. We were to leave at 
six the morning after we arrived, and we were 
not at our hotel much before eleven o'clock. 

In the morning we breakfasted at five, and 
then, in a great boat, with bag and baggage, 
were rowed out to the steamer, — a good sea-boat 
of perhaps four hundred tons. At six we sailed. 

I wrote from Malaga the next morning this 
account of the voyage : — 

"Malaga, May 30. 

" It is now six o'clock, and this pretty city of 
Malaga is rousing itself to its duties. We are no 
longer in the East. This place might be Norfolk 
or Savannah, but that four thousand years have 
finished it and given to it elegancies and pretti- 
nesses to those cities unknown. I am on the 
balcony of a palace, and my room is palatial. 
I do not remember that in the much-praised 
American hotel I ever found, at six in the 
morning, fresh carnations on the dressing-table 
of my chamber. But I am afraid this is excep- 
tional, for the senora who takes care of the camas 



84 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

(no gallantry will pretend that she is a senorita) 
herself laughed as she called attention to them, 
as if it were by some happy accident that they 
were there. 

" If my geography were shaky in any partic- 
ular, it was as to the difference between Cadiz 
and Malaga, This I knew, that from Malaga 
came raisins, while I never heard of Cadiz raisins. 
Also I went to school with a boy from Malaga, 
and never went to school with any boy from Ca- 
diz. But these doubts are now forever solved 
in my mind (and I hope will be, for this reader). 
Cadiz is outside the pillars of Hercules as far as 
Malaga is inside; so that our pretty coasting 
voyage of yesterday, in an admirable steamer, 
brought us through the Straits of Gibraltar. 

" I had my first look of Africa, and we spent 
four hours at anchor at Algeciras, in full sight of 
the great fortress itself. 

" I could have gone across and landed. But I 
thought I should dilate with the right emotions 
if I only beheld it from afar. Indeed, it is diffi- 
cult not to dilate, and that with many emotions, 
on this voyage. The African coast is often bold. 
We saw it under great advantages of mist and 
cloud on the mountains, quite symbolizing the 
mysterious place of Africa in the trinity of the 
Eastern continents. Gibraltar is simply magnifi- 
cent. I have ruined my pocket sketch-book by 



XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 85 

the number of outlines which I have dashed in 
at various points of view. The ladies worked 
with enthusiasm from the deck of the steamer 
after she came to anchor. The sea was perfectly 
smooth. You know how fond I am of steam- 
boat travelling, and by this detour we enabled 
ourselves to travel by day instead of night. 

" Algeciras, where I landed, is a town more 
Moorish in population, I suppose, than any town 
I have seen. I saw some very handsome faces 
among the boys. It seems very funny to see 
these picturesque boys, perhaps with a red sash 
round the waist, coming home from school with 
a cracked slate and what might be a worn-out 
Emerson's Arithmetic in a strap over the shoul- 
der, just as he might do in Dartmouth or Dud- 
ley Street. One of them had thrown another's 
cap into a tree on the plaza, just as he might do 
in Blackstone Square. The boy had coaxed a 
friend to lift him, while with a long stick he tried 
to shake it from the tree. The other boy was 
neither tall enough nor strong enough, and they 
could not reach it ; so I offered. Boy number 
one was afraid of the Frances e ; but another hand- 
some boy volunteered to try the great adven- 
ture, and I lifted him in triumph, so that he 
1 regained the felt, and felt what he regained.' 

" They were making preparations in their pretty 
public garden for a great fair which they are to 



86 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

have next week, in which two bull- fights, among 
other things, are provided. I walked in the 
Paseo, and had the luck to hear my first nightin- 
gale. It is rather difficult to dilate with the right 
emotions for the nightingale. The song is a 
good honest song, animated enough, rather 
plucky. 'Jug, jug, jug/ expresses it well 
enough. I am almost afraid I should not have 
noticed it, unless, indeed, as a sort of contralto 
among the sopranos of the other birds. We re- 
freshed ourselves with lemonade and other light 
drinks (sugar and water being the most popu- 
lar), gathered some shells on the beach, and went 
back to the ship to dinner. We weighed anchor 
again at six, and by sunset passed the rock of 
Gibraltar, as above, with the most lurid effects 
of red light behind the bold black of the head- 
land. It is virtually an island, like a gigantic 
Nahant, connected by a spit of sand only with 
the main, somewhat as Cadiz is. 

" They say that in the midst of the straits is a 
reef, with very deep surroundings, on all sides. 
Berini, an intelligent valet de place whom I 
brought round with me from Seville, asked me 
if it might not be that, in the days of the an- 
cients, on this reef there were veritably an- 
other pillar of Hercules. He is not satisfied 
with the Abyla of the African coast of to-day. 
Also he, who is a Gibraltar boy by birth, says 



XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 87 

that the cave of St. Michael's there has a myste- 
rious passage disappearing no one knows where. 
1 May not this have been a submarine tunnel 
through which the monkeys — the only monkeys 
in Europe — came from Africa to the rock of 
Gibraltar?' This suggests weird considerations 
worthy of Sindbad. The present number of 
monkeys on the rock of Gibraltar is about thir- 
ty-five. The English government cares for them 
more assiduously than for Spanish refugees. 
The number seen by the sentries is reported 
daily by the officer in charge of the outposts. 

"We had a lovely moonlight on the sea; but 
one cannot enjoy even moonlight forever, and 
at 8.30 we went to bed. In my dreams, all night 
I have been officiating with untold difficulties in 
certain obsequies in honor of Mr. Emerson, and 
certain others in Greece in memory of Socrates. 
At 12.30 we arrived here, but have only just now 
landed and passed the custom-house ; it is the 
fourth time that these trunks have been exam- 
ined in Spain since we passed the Spanish fron- 
tier. We are now awaiting our coffee, breakfast 
No. 1." 

The ancients had no coffee ; whether they ate 
anything when they got out of bed I do not 
know. But all boys are rather ground because 
they are taught to translate prandium, breakfast, 



88 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

and ccena, supper, leaving no space for dinner, 
and no word for it. But I am tempted to think 
they had the customs these people have now. 
The two meals are, one at ten or eleven, some- 
times later, the other at five or six, also some- 
times late, as late as nine, of which the first 
is called almuerzo or dejeuner, and the second 
coniida or diner. They resemble each other 
almost precisely, much more than the Eng- 
lish lunch and dinner do. You have five or six 
courses at both, warm meats, vegetables, wine if 
you choose, and, in short, I know no scientific 
distinction. These were, according to me, the 
prandium and coena of the ancients. I believe 
they did not have prandium till twelve ; no more 
do the French have their dejeuner till twelve. 

I learned in France an old proverb, originating 
with the Church, that liquids do not break fast, 
and they got a formal decree that coffee did not 
break fast. Accordingly a priest may take cof- 
fee before he administers the Mass. Alas, too 
many take wine ! I think it possible that the 
universal habit of early coffee in these parts may 
have come from the ecclesiastical influence. 

FROM MALAGA TO GRANADA. 

Washington Irving's charming book on the 
Conquest of Granada would be the true guide- 



XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 89 

book for the journey from Malaga to Granada, 
which the reader is now to take with us. It is 
one of those journeys which such a party as 
ours would gladly take on horseback, and I 
fancy that, at another season of the year, that 
would be a good way to do it. But I would not 
undertake this with ladies, at the beginning of 
June ; and, as the reader will see, we were 
obliged, all through our Spanish tour, to save 
time where we could. 

Whoever will run through Irving' s book will 
read of the latest bit of genuine chivalry that is 
left in history. If anybody cares for the truth, 
and some people do, here is a truer picture 
of what chivalry was and is than is in the Ama- 
dis of Gaul or Esplandian. And I should like 
to say, in passing, to any young friend of mine 
interested at once in literature and in the truth, 
that I think none of the writers on chivalry 
have, as yet, dissected out the lies of the ro- 
mancers from the truth of history. I think it 
would be a nice literary enterprise for some 
young fellow to do that thing. Let somebody 
tell us where and when " the knight-errant " of 
romance really existed in the world; and let 
him tell us how much this six-footed tramp was 
respected or honored by the people of his own 
time. And, to come back to Granada, anybody 
who wants to understand the Spanish conquests 



90 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES, 

in Mexico and Peru, and to know how there 
came to be in the world such men as the Spanish 
conquerors, needs to acquaint himself well w T ith 
this history of desperate fight, so well described 
by Irving. It was really the last appearance of 
plate armor to any purpose in Europe. In 
America, as against arrows, clubs, and stones, 
plate armor held its own for half a century 
more. 

We took a train at one o'clock in the after- 
noon at Malaga to run nearly north. That is 
the general direction of the road. But we have 
to pass the Sierra, and this we do by the most 
wonderful series of zigzags and tunnels, cling- 
ing to the edges of mountain gorges, and creat- 
ing a road where a goat might be glad to find 
his way. All this is the scene of that running 
battle, which lasted nearly a week, which Irving 
describes so picturesquely, where the knights of 
Antiquera set out to take Malaga by surprise, 
and were themselves surprised in these very 
passes by El Zagal and the Moorish cavaliers. 
These men understood the country better and 
were better dressed for their business than the 
Spaniards. 

Indeed, it seems like the difficult creeping 
which one sometimes experiences in a dream, 
when one thinks of those heavy-mailed Spanish 
knights, after they had lost their horses, crawl- 



XERES, CADIZ, AND MALAGA. 91 

ing, like lobsters, up and down the rocks of 
these ravines. On the other hand, you are sur- 
prised, as always, when you find how many of 
them came out of the enterprise alive. If they 
could keep their plate armor on their backs, it 
seems to have served a certain purpose. 

A few hours only of this railway riding bring 
you out at a sort of Ayer Junction, high up in 
the hills, of which one ought to say, in passing, 
that it is a much more picturesque place and has 
a much better fonda than ever Ayer Junction 
had. At this place, the name of which is Loja, 
I had my first experience of their gracious way 
of collecting your scot for dinner. Grave-look- 
ing men in black came round with plates which 
looked like silver, which they passed solemnly 
over your left shoulder. I had seen some women 
about in the dress of Sisters of Charity, and as 
these contribution plates went down the side of 
the table opposite me, I had no thought but 
that this was a collection made for the benefit 
of some hospital. In my own secret mind I 
praised the liberality of the travellers for giving 
as much as they did, always three or four francs, 
and this, as I observed, with a certain regularity. 
But it was not till the very moment before the 
man, whom I thought a sub-priest, came to me, 
that I perceived that it was thus that we were 
paying for our dinners, and that the poor who 



92 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

were befriended were the wayfarers, of whom 
we were four. 

Leaving Loja, we took another train, this time 
eastward, with the higher mountains of the 
Sierra now to the south of us. We were thus 
again on the line of rail by which we might 
have come more directly from Seville, but for 
our detour by sea to see Africa and the rock of 
Gibraltar. 

Thus, through a lovely afternoon, we followed 
up that wonderful valley which is called the 
Vega, the spoil of which was the prize of the 
fourteen years of battle which preceded the fall 
of Granada. Ronda, Alhama ("woe is me, Al- 
hama!"), Lucena, and Lopera, I think, Za- 
hara, Sante Fe, and other cities, too many for 
me to name, are in sight one side or the other 
as the train winds along on the edge of the 
valley in the latter hours, constantly ascending. 
For us there was the glory of a June sunset 
behind the spurs of the Sierra, which we had 
left at Loja. Then a long twilight, as the train 
still sped on through what has been for a thou- 
sand years perhaps the most fertile valley in the 
world. At last, all the wishing in the world 
would not keep it light for us an hour after the 
sun had gone down, so that our last hours ride 
was in darkness, and in darkness we arrived at 
the station at Granada. 



CHAPTER VII. 

GRANADA. THE ALHAMBRA. 

If this reader has ever had the pleasure of 
riding up to Cornell University from the city of 
Ithaca, he will have what my evangelical friends 
call a realizing sense of what it is to ride in 
a rather shaky omnibus up to the Washington 
Irving Hotel, high in the Alhambra gardens, 
from the low level of the railway in the valley. 
The effect is enhanced if the ride be taken in 
crass darkness, in an omnibus which may have 
been that old " Governor Brooks " which ran 
hourly between Boston and the Norfolk House 
in 1833. It seemed to me to have been trans- 
ferred, without repairs or new paint, to serve the 
Granada line after forty-nine years. 

The ascent is so nearly vertical, that you have 
a feeling that if you lose your headway, only for 
an instant, the mules will fall backward over 
your head, the whole rattle-trap pivoting on 
the hind axle, and that you will all go down 
into the valley again, mules first, on their backs, 
omnibus on top, and passengers on their heads. 



94 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

But we were fortunately spared this adventure, 
as I have, up to this time, been spared the ex- 
perience of it at Ithaca, — else the reader would 
not be following these notes now. 

After a little, zigzag roads up through a dense 
grove, in which nightingales were singing and 
brooks babbling, took the place of the perpen- 
dicular ascent, the omnibus stopped, and the 
cheerful and cordial host of the " Washington 
Irving " welcomed us at his door. Thus began 
a fortnight of life, more like life in the Arabian 
Nights than any of us are likely to know until 
we go to the Alhambra again. 

To confess ignorance is a capital rule, and it 
has been of the greatest service to me in a long 
and varied life. To quote Lewis's excellent 
joke at Bellombre, I have had a great deal to 
confess sooner or later, and whenever I have 
obeyed the rule I have profited. On this occa- 
sion I will confess that I never knew what the 
Alhambra was, — whether it were a palace or a 
district. The truth is, it is either or both, as 
you choose to call it. 

To begin at the beginning, this projecting 
shelf of land, running out from a spur of the 
Sierra, must have been, from the moment when 
it was made, one of the most beautiful places in 
the world. You are three thousand feet or 
more above the level of the sea. We had 



GRANADA, 95 

ascended so far, more than half a mile, verti- 
cally in our afternoon's ride from Malaga. Let 
the reader recollect that the Crawford House, 
at the head of the White Mountain Notch, is 
but nineteen hundred feet above the sea. The 
plateau occupied by the Alhambra is really 
more like what five and twenty acres of table- 
land on the top of Mount Webster would be. I 
remember looking down in the valley of George- 
town in Colorado, from a height above that 
town, much as one looks down upon Granada 
from the Alhambra. 

Well, when the Moors came into possession of 
Southern Spain, having the whole country to 
choose from, they did as Uncle 'Zeke bids us do, 
and " took the best." That is to say, they se- 
lected this plateau, high embanked by nature 
above the valley, which commands, on the west, 
a view of the Vega, fifty-seven square miles of 
matchless fertility, running away from the eye 
into the purple of the distance ; and commands, 
on the other side, the majestic view of the range 
of the Sierras, showing in its gorges streaks of 
perennial snow at every season of the year. 
Practically, these Moorish sovereigns had all the 
artistic skill there was afloat in the world, and, 
to use this skill, they had all the money they 
needed. Having resolved to live here in this 
midway climate, which is never too cold, never 



g6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

too warm, where you can always see winter by 
looking to the east, and always see summer by 
looking to the west, they bade their architects 
build the most beautiful palace they could build, 
and the most comfortable, and bade their gar- 
deners make the most beautiful gardens. In 
these gardens, observe, pine trees dream of palms 
and palms of pine, to their hearts' content. The 
gardeners and the architects took them at their 
word, and did their best. In 1492 they and theirs 
Were turned out. It is now many generations 
since any king has really lived in those beautiful 
palaces, though a mattress is sometimes laid in 
one of the chambers for the King of Spain, if he 
come that way, and I think the same thing was 
done for the Prince of Wales. But the palace 
has never been permitted to fall into ruin. For 
the last generation it has been attended to with 
the wisest and most reverent care. The gov- 
ernor of the whole place is now Senor Contreras, 
an antiquarian, who is also an artist, with both 
conscience and taste. With great wisdom and 
delicacy, he uses the funds which are intrusted 
to him in keeping up the gardens and in restor- 
ing, wonderfully wlII, such decoration as time 
or carelessness had destroyed. I am by no 
means sure that the glamour, which time has 
thrown over the palace in four centuries, does 
not more than make up for any splendor of oc- 



GRANADA. 97 

cupation, which it lost when the Moors were 
driven away. 

But I see that, like every one else, I hang 
round the outside, without describing the Al- 
hambra. I suppose a Moor would have said to 
you that it was a fortress, and such was the cen- 
tral part of what we now call the Alhambra. The 
name, according to the received etymology, is a 
corruption of the Arabic kal-at al hamra, the 
red castle. Red alludes to the color of the rock. 
On the spot they say there are three colors to 
the Alhambra, — red, blue, and green ; and in the 
fortnight that I was there the rocks were always 
red, the sky was of the deepest blue, and the 
trees of the greenest green. I do not know what 
the committee of the Boston Art Club would 
say to Alhambra pictures. It is said that when 
Miss Forbes sent them her clever sketches from 
Colorado they would not admit them, because 
they had never seen rocks that were so red. At 
the same time she sent some decorous Milton 
Hill sketches, which were accepted with en- 
thusiasm. If my readers share this prejudice 
against positive color, they must not go to the 
Alhambra. 

The walls and towers of the old Moorish de- 
fence still stand. On one side they needed no 
wall, for a cat or a lizard would find it hard to 
work up the cliff from the valley far below. 

7 



98 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES, 

Just outside these walls, surrounded still by- 
beautiful gardens, are the two hotels of " Wash- 
ington Irving," generally spelled with a Y for its 
first letter, and the Siete Suelos, parted only 
from each other by a roadway. " Siete Suelos " 
means seven stories, that having been the name 
of one of the towers on the wall, close by. Be- 
side these hotels, there is a group of other 
houses with their gardens, extending, I know 
not how far, upon different plateaux of the 
mountains. Some of them are handsome villas, 
some of them are modest boarding-houses, and 
in this region, intersected by rambling roads, a 
great many people, who have the same tastes 
which the Moorish sovereigns had, come to 
spend now winter and now summer. It is the 
only place known to me to which people go 
purely for recreation, where the hotels are kept 
open all the year round, and where the attrac- 
tions seem as great at one season as at another. 
Strictly speaking, I suppose the region within 
the walls of the fortress, perhaps twenty-five 
acres in all, is the Alhambra. But I am quite 
sure that in conversation the name " Alhambra " 
would apply to all the gardens and villas on the 
hillside. 

Among these villas, at some little distance 
from the castle itself, is one presented by the 
Spanish government to that distinguished lady, 



THE ALHAMBRA. 99 

the Countess Calderon, who was for so many 
years our townswoman. If, as I believe, to this 
lady was intrusted the early education of the 
present King of Spain, Spain cannot be too 
eager to express its gratitude to her ; for every- 
thing seems to show that this young man is ad- 
mirably fitted for his very delicate position. He 
certainly must be spoken of as one of the most 
interesting and remarkable men in Europe at 
the present time. 

Any one who has his route to lay out will see 
that there is a certain moral advantage, if I may 
so call it, in taking Cordova before Seville, and 
Seville before Granada. If we had taken this in 
reverse, we never should have enjoyed Seville and 
Granada in the way we did. As we came, we 
took our alphabet of orientalism, then our words 
of two syllables, and now our literature. Thanks 
to Queen Isabella II., if she did nothing else 
good, the place is in perfect order. With this 
introduction I may trust the reader to some 
notes taken from day to day upon the spot. 



The walks and avenues are like those of a 
modern palace in neatness and beauty. The 
restorations in the palace of the Alhambra it- 
self are so perfect, that they need a trained eye 

LofC. 



IOO SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

to tell where they begin. The patio of orange- 
trees is in perfect cultivation, the lions are all 
on their feet, and even those whose ears were 
broken off have new ones. Last night we went 
up to see the moonlight effects. Exigeants 
connoisseurs were disappointed, as the moon 
would not rise quite high enough for them. 
But for me, who am not used to valley views 
seventy miles long, under the light of a full 
moon, the prospect, with the heavy shadows of 
our cliff over Granada, was sufficiently wonder- 
ful. You can imagine to a degree what witch- 
work the moonlight would make on one of 
these walls of ivory carving, as it shines through 
the queer, varied Saracenic arches. We were 
taught in our childhood some stuff about four 
orders, more or less, of architecture. For clear, 
sheer beauty, this Saracenic arch, left out from 
that list, is the leader of them all. I rather 
think it is the best of all to adapt to popular 
and practical use. 

The city of Granada is a lively town of seventy- 
five thousand people, improving itself, opening 
new streets, having a fine bull-fight to-day, and 
preparing for Corpus Christi on Wednesday. 
Up a steep street like Bowdoin Street you 
climb, and come to an arch, which is the arch 
of the Alhambra. You pass it, and enter a 
heavily shaded grove, laid out with parks and 



THE ALHAMBRA. 101 

roads, in very careful order, the roads still as- 
cending a steep hill. This is the beginning of 
the gardens of the Alhambra. This is the 
ascent which late at night reminded me of the 
roads at Cornell University. You continue as- 
cending, and in five minutes, on the right and 
left, lo, two hotels, like rival White Mountain 
houses. One is the Siete Suelos, and one the 
Washington Irving. These are crowded into 
corners left by the fortifications of the Alham- 
bra; for the Alhambra, being a royal palace, 
was fortified, on one side, inaccessible on a high 
cliff, on the other side, by walls, like those at 
Ticonderoga or Quebec or Chester. 

So, then, when we have breakfasted we can 
take a short walk through the grove to this 
great wall ; and as no Moors defend it, we pass 
through the Puerta del Justicia, or the Puerta de 
Vino, or some sally-port without a name, and 
we are in the great fortress, which the Moors 
garrisoned, and which commanded the town. 
Remember that cannons, large and small, were 
well in use before 1492, when the fortress fell. 
In this enceinte are now many houses, built 
from old ones. Here lives, for example, Con- 
treras, the skilful restorer, and governor of the 
whole ; here is the ruin of an unfinished palace 
of Charles the Fifth ; here are great box-gar- 
dens, laid out to occupy old parade grounds; 



102 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

and here, at last, largest and most important, 
is the beautiful palace of the Alhambra, the 
nucleus and queen of the whole. You see in it 
what I suppose you might see in Ispahan or 
Damascus or Cairo, only that you are not per- 
mitted to do so. But as you are not permitted 
to do so there, it is a very good thing for pure 
Westerners like us, as it .were so many Visi- 
goths at the court of one of Cleopatra's de- 
scendants, to see how comfortably these people 
lived. 

Perhaps it adds to the interest to see the 
blood-stain where thirty-six Abencerrages chiefs 
were killed by one of these Moorish kings not 
long before Granada fell. To say truly, though 
we have a natural sympathy for these poor 
Moors, who builded so much better than their 
successors knew, that as to desert, they can be 
said to have deserved but little. Good archi- 
tecture is hardly a moral merit. If it were, I 
think it is a merit which belonged more to the 
ancestors of Boabdil and those who were turned 
out, than to themselves. And for themselves, 
after dipping a little into their history, I am dis- 
posed to say that if any persons ever deserved 
the vengeance of the Almighty it was these 
same Moorish chiefs. As for their people, I 
know nothing, and say nothing. 

To return to the Alhambra from this digres- 



THE ALHAMBRA. 103 

sion. Once within the palace there are still 
many courts. One of these is the lovely patio, 
blazing with pomegranates, orange-trees, lemons, 
roses, and bananas, which might properly be 
called the garden of the Alhambra. This, or 
the Court of Lions, is perhaps the central 
almond meat of the stone of the fruit, from the 
outside of which we have removed so many 
shreds and shells, all which more or less re- 
ceive the name of the Alhambra. 

You can conceive what endless walks, ex- 
plorations, chances to sketch, chances to get 
lost, all these gardens and lines of fortress and 
ruined towers, now accessible and now inacces- 
sible, afford. From the " Gate of Justice," in 
a painting of the time, the Moors are repre- 
sented as pouring out to be destroyed by their 
conquerors. 

The foliage has the green of the very earliest 
spring, and the flowers the richness of tropical 
summer at the same moment. 

As you sketch, a little stream is babbling 
at your side. And if one were living at the 
Alhambra, such a stream might be running 
through the midst of what would seem as our 
front entry. 

The palace itself is perhaps the most charm- 
ing place of all. I read aloud there, as the la- 
dies drew, the speeches at the Historical Society 



104 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

in memory of dear Mr. Emerson. You know I 
have always been at ease in palaces, and have 
a feeling that I was born to live in one. And 
these domestic occupations give one " a realiz- 
ing sense" of what good times 1 they might have 
had there were their daily cares anything but 
cutting off each other's heads. As, in fact, they 
lived here seven hundred years, and as there are 
not more than seven crimes in the books in 
that period, it may be that to them the Alham- 
bra was as peaceful a place as Washington seems 
to us, despite Guiteau and Booth and the Eng- 
lish occupation of 1814. Any way, we had 
many lovely afternoons there. It is rather the 
central point of all our ramblings, and we had 
permits to draw there, for all the party. 



We went down into the city of Granada to 
see the opening of the Festa of Corpus Christi, 
which lasts several days, and obstructs a good 
deal the regular business, such as it is, of the 
place. The nucleus of the affair was the giving 
up by the Ayuntamiento to the governor of the 
province of the public square, that it might be 

1 Let no New Englander fear that this phrase is provincial. 
Pepys says, " We had a glorious time ! " and Dryden sang, 
" The sons of Belial had a glorious time ! " 



THE ALHAMBllA. 1 05 

open, I suppose, to all the province for their 
festivities. Whether this actual ceremony, which 
is, as you see, a sort of Artillery Election, ever 
in fact took place, I do not know. What we 
saw was very much like Fourth of July on our 
Common, — great crowds of country people 
swaying to and fro with whatever motive or with 
none. I think our two artists, making hasty 
studies of heads and costumes, interested los 
hombres and las mugeres and los ninos and las 
ninas as much as did the fountains or the bands 
of music. 

In the middle of the square is erected a great 
canvas temple, for any functions that may need 
a lofty platform. Around this little fountains 
play, some from the muskets of small soldiers, 
some propelling the swords of other soldiers, 
and others making cavalrymen to rock. Quite 
on the outside of the square, on a high staging, 
run a series of twenty-two well-painted satiri- 
cal pictures, hitting off the follies of the time. 
One is a school of men and women learning the 
decimal system of mensuration, in fear that, if 
they do not, the Alcalde will refuse them certifi- 
cates of marriage. One is a philosopher aban- 
doning his globes and books, and practising for 
bull-fighting, because it pays better. Between 
the pictures, painted in large letters, are doggerel 
rhymes, illustrating them. At one end of the 



106 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

square is a long poem, painted in large letters, 
an ode, a hymn on the Incarnation, and another 
glorifying Granada and its history. In another 
park are regular booths, to sell candy and other 
fairings, just like ours in general plan, but ar- 
ranged with one plan, and a simple (canvas) 
architectural effect, so as to give unity to the 
whole. There was to be an illumination. But 
the Ayuntamiento owes the Gas Company 
twenty thousand dollars already ; so on Monday 
night the Gas Company shut off the gas from 
the town, and people had to come and go in 
darkness. 

The palace itself is an endless satisfaction. 
Every time you walk there, you discover some- 
thing new. Yesterday I indulged myself in a 
book of the Arabian inscriptions on the walls. 
With the notes, it makes a reasonable volume. 
There were days when I could read a little Ara- 
bic. I have now forgotten the few words I 
knew. But I found gradually that I could make 
out the characters. The ladies each make two 
pictures a day, one in the morning light, one in 
the afternoon light, with endless adjunct studies 
from the bedroom balconies and from terraces 
or other lookouts ; for, with every new day, 
some one has discovered that there is a tower 
or garden which has not been visited before, and 
from which there is a new view or in which there 
are new effects. 



THE ALHAMBRA. IO/ 

Fortuny and Regnault really made their homes 
here. On the Siete Suelos wall are inscriptions 
which tell when they lived there. A gypsy is 
in attendance to pose for artists as he did for 
them. In this land of color one is always 
tempted to paint. I have said that green, red, 
and blue are the colors of Granada. Add to 
this, that excepting one day there has not been 
a cloud as big as a man's hand on this blue sky, 
which is a defiance to the deepest ultramarine, 
— for all which blue sky in June we are so high 
that the air is even bracing. We had no expe- 
rience in a fortnight of June of what we should 
call a hot day in Boston. 



As we came home from the exquisite Gene- 
ralife gardens, we were listening to nightingales 
singing in June, and looking on the snow of the 
Sierra Nevada. 

" Have I dilated on nightingales since Algeci- 
ras? You know I never heard any before. I 
have veered to and fro in my views about them. 
At one time I said that if a single frog, neither 
of the shrill chirping kind of the spring, nor the 
deep, bass onderdonk kind of the autumn, could 
be set at his lonely " tunk," " tunk," " tunk," at 
midnight, he might be mistaken for a nightin- 



108 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

gale. But since that I have had better luck. I 
think I was fairly waked by one, one night, in 
the very dead of night. The n of the " tank " 
ameliorated itself almost to /, so liquid was it 
The tone is so deep as to suggest that the bird 
sings contralto, and not soprano, and the tout 
ensemble is a sort of richness which certainly 
few notes have. Sometimes a mocking-bird 
gives you the same sound. This midnight song 
is more interesting, though more monotonous, 
than the twitter of the same bird at sunset. Do 
you know, that the song is the conjugal duty of 
the husband? He sings to his mate (not to the 
rose) while she sits on the eggs. If he fails to 
sing, she dies ! Poor fellow, what do you sup- 
pose his rights to be, if she should go to sleep 
for half an hour? 



NOTES ON THE CARTHUJA. 

" Friday. We took our drive at nine o'clock 
to the convent still called the Carthuja, because 
it was a convent of the Carthusians, before such 
things were suppressed. Thirty old monks had 
the benefit of it, of whom, now, all but two are 
dead, and nobody has any benefit from it ex- 
cept sight-seers. But I suppose the funds which 
sustained such magnificence now go to govern- 
ment, or some dependant on government. 



THE ALHAMBRA. 109 

" The show-rooms are magnificent ; on the 
whole, I think the most complete and lavish 
decoration which I have ever seen. There are 
several pictures and several statues by Alonzo 
Cano, this more than Raffaelle and more than 
Murillo, of Spanish art, of whom those critics 
with whom we are most familiar know absolutely 
nothing. As in most of the Spanish religious 
buildings, the pictures seem painted for the 
places they are in, parts of the decoration, and 
not stuck on, as an afterthought. There are 
other good pictures and statues. But, after all, 
the glory of the place is architectural and in the 
richness of every detail. I never dreamed of 
such mosaic, of wood and ivory, as in the doors 
and cabinets of the vestry, which is, perhaps, the 
finest room in Europe/' 

There are woods all about Granada, and rivers 
running through it, and you can see the hills 
around all covered by gardens. About half a 
mile from the city begin the Sierra Morena, with 
their tops covered with snow. The Moors 
founded Granada, and in their time it was much 
more splendid than it is now. While they were 
there, there were four hundred thousand of them. 
The city was nine miles round, and there were 
more than a thousand towers guarding it. Even 
now it has several fine buildings, two large 
squares, sixteen smaller ones, many public foun- 



110 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

tains, seven colleges, eleven hospitals, a fine thea- 
tre built by the French, and sixty churches. 

On the left bank of the Genii is the city of 
Santa Fe. It was founded by Isabella. During 
the siege of Granada the Queen made a vow not 
to change her linen until the city was taken. 
To frighten the enemy, her camp was changed 
into a fortified town, and was called Santa Fe. 
Unfortunately for the Queen, the Moors held out 
so well that it was long before the town was 
taken, and by that time the Queen's linen had 
turned to a yellow color. But as the Queen wore 
it the shade became quite fashionable, and is 
known to this day as " Isabella." It was in 
Santa Fe that Ferdinand and Isabella approved 
of the first expedition undertaken by Columbus. 
In 1807 the city was almost destroyed by an 
earthquake. 

I try to spare this reader, my unknown but 
loyal friend, the description of our daily meals. 
It cannot interest him much to know that the 
apricots of Ronda were riper than those of Cor- 
1 dova, or the figs larger. But as the guide-books 
have a great deal to say about Spanish food, and 
as I write these notes rather for people who are 
doubting about routes for future travel, I am 
tempted to say something here about the table, 
which has and ought to have a good deal to do 
with the plans of people who are looking for- 
ward to a holiday. 



THE ALHAMBRA. Ill 

Garlic is always spoken of as a terror in Spain. 
Let me then say, once for all, that, till the last 
day I was in Spain, I did not know what the 
taste of garlic was. On that day my sister asked 
me if I liked the flavor of the mutton. When I 
said I did, she told me that its peculiar flavor 
was that of the much-dreaded garlic. I have 
suffered much more annoyance in Philadelphia 
in a week of springtime from the flavor in 
milk of what they call. "wild garlic/' than I did 
in six weeks of Spain from all foreign odors or 
flavors put together. And this, as Philadel- 
phians know, is saying very little. 

Everywhere we found clean and neat tables, 
ready service at table, and abundance of fruit 
at every meal. The cooking resembles that of 
New England in some things more than that of 
France. 

As far as I understand, the famous olla po- 
drida is the same thing now known as a puchero, 
though in this authorities differ. It is simply, 
as I think, the " biled dish " of washing-day in 
the country. It is corned beef served in slices, 
but sliced after boiling, served on a dish with 
abundant gravy, while at one end of the dish 
there is a heap of onions, at another one of 
string-beans ; on one side, perhaps, cabbage, al- 
ways a heavy layer in some place of baked beans 
(or pease), and, for garnishes, bits of sausage 



112 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

cut in slices, and perhaps of other such meats, 
maybe sliced tongue. These things are not, 
however, boiled in the same pot, as in the " biled 
dish " they would have been, I think. Perhaps 
what I call baked beans may have been boiled 
with the corned beef; probably they were. The 
other things are cooked separately, but served 
together. The effect is exactly as if a hungry 
man came in, when his wife had prepared an 
abundant dinner, and on this large plate he ar- 
ranged the different things all ready to begin. 
The dish is handed to you thus prepared, and 
you take from it what you like. I would not go 
into such detail, but that olla podrida has now a 
name in literature. 

Really the most striking thing in the table is 
the abundance of fruit, of which I spoke, served 
always at breakfast and dinner. We had apri- 
cots and oranges at every meal ; cherries almost 
always. With us at home the season of cherries 
is very short. In Spain they know how to pro- 
long it, and they bring them to the market in 
much better condition than we do. Strawberries 
are the small, old-fashioned garden variety. 
They are very good, and must be very cheap. We 
always have them at dinner, sometimes at lunch 
or breakfast. For us, after we left Seville, figs 
appeared. Per contra, I did not see a hot bis- 
cuit, a slice of toast in any form, nor anything in 



THE ALHAMBRA. 113 

the shape of buckwheats or flapjacks. Cro- 
quettes they have as we do, and give them the 
same name. Dinner is served as at a table d'hote 
in Switzerland, but that the fish comes later. 
The object is to break the substantial dishes, 
always three, with entremets of less importance. 
Strange to say, chocolate seems no more an ar- 
ticle of general national use than with us. You 
find it when you least expect it ; but at hotels it 
is just as much a nuisance as with us, and as 
likely to be badly made. Coffee is pretty good. 
It seems from Don Quixote that they used chic- 
ory long before they heard of coffee, though I 
cannot see why they did not get it from the 
Moors as early as the tenth century. Tea is 
never heard of in common use at the good 
hotels ; you can order it, of course, but you have 
hot water brought you. 

In this hasty review I have said nothing of the 
charms of cooking in oil. It seems to me that 
we might do well to try it. The result is deli- 
cious ; nothing seems to get soaked, as one finds 
at a bad hotel where they have lard enough. 
I have fancied that perhaps you have to use less, 
for some unknown reason. Any way, the crisp- 
ness and sweetness of fried things is very ob- 
servable. 

I sent for the steward at the Washington Yr- 
ving hotel and made him give me the direction 

8 



114 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

for serving gaspacho, which is a sort of summer 
soup, if it deserves that name, served cold. As 
I read his directions now in the midst of winter, 
the recipe seems to me a little like that for stone 
soup, which made a favorite story of my boyhood. 
Such as it is, however, some of your house- 
keeping readers may like to try it when the ther- 
mometer is ninety-eight in the shade. You will 
observe that he has left us free to vary the pro- 
portion of the ingredients to suit our taste. 

Gaspacho. Cut onions, tomatoes, and cucum- 
bers in very small solid pieces. Serve in water, 
of which there should be plenty, stirring in oil 
and vinegar, with pepper and salt as you please. 

He also gave us his formula, such as it is, for 
Arroz a la Valenciana, a very nice preparation 
of rice, not unlike in effect to the Eastern pilau : 
Rice, chicken, ham, fish, pease, tomatoes, arti- 
chokes, pepper, salt, oil. Baked like escalloped 
oysters. 

One of the earliest associations which most Eng- 
lish readers have with the Alhambra is in their 
memory of Irving's " Tales of the Alhambra/ 1 
And those who are such sturdy fiction readers 
that they have never followed up that charming 
book with " The Conquest of Granada," have a 
great pleasure yet in store. He is, to this hour, 
the received historian of the region. And the 
landlord at the Washington Irving hotel put into 



THE ALHAMBRA. 115 

my hands a French translation of "The Conquest 
of Granada " as soon as I arrived. 

Irving was led to these literary undertakings 
as he worked upon the Life of Columbus. To 
this subject his attention was called in the winter 
of 1825-26 by Mr. Alexander Everett, who had 
then just been appointed by John Quincy Adams 
as our Minister to Spain. Irving was at Bordeaux 
when he received a letter from Mr. Everett, tell- 
ing him that Navarrete was on the great work of 
publishing, with proper notes, the original docu- 
ments of the voyages of Columbus, and suggest- 
ing that here was a subject worthy of his pen. 
Mr. Everett proposed a translation of the book. 
Irving at once joined him in Madrid, and there 
Mr. Everett gave him the advantages of an at- 
tache of the legation. As soon as Navarette's 
book appeared, Irving perceived, with that sound 
good sense which characterized all his life, that 
the form of it was not such as would be attrac- 
tive to readers not themselves historians. He 
saw, also, that most such readers would want, not 
these documents only, but a connected narrative 
of Columbus's life and discoveries. In Madrid he 
had every advantage for such work. He was liv- 
ing in the house of Mr. Rich, the American con- 
sul, who had an admirable library of books and 
papers bearing on Spanish colonial history. The 
royal library, of which I shall have occasion to 



Il6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

speak again, and, indeed, all the Spanish collec- 
tions, were open to him. And so, fortunately for 
us, he fell to work on the Life of Columbus, which 
he wrought out so admirably well. 

He originally inserted, in the early part of this 
book, as so many amusing or interesting episodes, 
some of the narratives which are now to be found 
in the " Tales of the Alhambra" and some of those 
in " The Conquest of Granada/' The reader must 
remember that our Columbus was present in the 
flesh when the Moors surrendered the fortress of 
the Alhambra, and, with the eyes that saw the 
Bahamas a few months after, saw the procession 
file out from the gateway for the act of capitula- 
tion. To make himself intimate with the geog- 
raphy and local colonies of the Moorish war, and 
to study documents in Seville also, Irving resided 
in that city for some months. He also made vari- 
ous excursions up and down this lonely Vega, so 
that he might see for himself the fortress and 
cities which were the scenes so often of attack 
and repulse. The longest stay which he made 
anywhere was, very naturally, in the Alhambra 
itself. In those days matters were easily admin- 
istered here, and, as the reader will remember, 
Irving was permitted actually to live in the pal- 
ace. I have seen many other persons who had 
enjoyed this privilege. Many more have I seen 
who had lived in one or another lodging-house 



THE ALHAMBRA. II 7 

within the old walls of the Alhambra, and so are 
in the habit of saying that they had lived in the 
Alhambra. But Irving actually slept, ate and 
drank, and wrote his letters and read his news- 
papers, in one or the other of the rooms of the 
palace. 

As the work of the Life of Columbus went on, 
he was afraid that he was interweaving too many 
threads of romance into the web of history, and 
eventually, before he published the book, he sep- 
arated from it what did not belong strictly to the 
personality of Columbus, and made from the more 
historical portions the " Conquest of Granada," 
which is veritable history, although Fra Aga- 
pida appears in it as an interpreter, somewhat 
as in Carlyle's histories Mr. Dryasdust appears. 
From the more romantic studies Irving made up 
the charming " Tales of the Alhambra." 

One of our most distinguished officers has con- 
tributed to that great History of Discovery, in 
this past summer, a very valuable and instructive 
study. Admiral Fox, who administered the prac- 
tical work of the Navy Department in the Civil 
War, has published his admirable study of the 
Landfall of Columbus, which leaves little or any 
doubt as to the spot which they first lighted on 
after the tedious voyage. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 

In Seville I had found with the greatest diffi- 
culty a Protestant church. It belongs to what 
calls itself the National Church of Spain, which, 
in the whole peninsula, collects, I think, some- 
where between ten and twenty congregations. 
In all, the branches of Protestant communicants 
count up sixty or seventy congregations only 
throughout the country. Under the present 
constitution all forms of worship are permitted, 
but only the Catholic Church may make its wor- 
ship public. The interpretation of this last sav- 
ing clause varies with the mood of the time and 
with the administration of government. Just 
now it is strictly construed, so that persons not 
Catholics do not consider themselves permitted 
to announce their public services in the news- 
papers. 

It was perfectly well known at our hotel in 
Seville that there was a Protestant church some- 
where. But where it was, was doubtful ; and as 
of the time of service all parties were as ignorant 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 1 19 

and indifferent as a gentlemanly clerk at a hotel 
in Atlanta or New Orleans would be apt to be 
when asked the hour of service at the Unitarian 
church there, we finally went, at a venture, at 
what seemed the average time, to the square 
indicated. Arriving there, we found a certain 
agreement among the loafers in attendance as to 
the place of worship. Clearly enough, it had 
been built for a church. At the door an old 
woman was found, who announced that the morn- 
ing service was just over, but that service would 
be renewed in the evening, at nine o'clock. 

I am disposed to believe that these somewhat 
abnormal hours, giving a service early in the 
morning and late in the evening, were selected 
intentionally, that the church might not interfere 
with the hours of Catholic worship ; or to state 
the same thing in another way, that worshippers 
might come to the Protestant service without 
losing a chance at the Catholic service. Mr. 
Moody, as may be remembered, ordered his 
Sunday services with similar deference to exist- 
ing institutions. 

At nine in the evening, accordingly, I repaired 
again to the place, and found sixty or eighty 
people assembled, and a clergyman dressed in 
a white surplice carrying on a liturgical service. 
The assembly was silent and devout in manner, 
and joined reverently in the parts of the liturgy 



120 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

which belonged to them. They sang with great 
spirit Spanish hymns. 

The liturgy was formed throughout, as I 
learned afterwards from the bishop whom I vis- 
ited in Madrid, on the old Mozarabic or National 
Rite of Spain. This service, based on what is 
known to theologians as the liturgy of St. James, 
was the original national service first known in 
Spain, and in universal use there until the Moor- 
ish conquests. The Moors, tolerant enough to 
worshippers who did not assail their institutions, 
permitted the Christians who chose to meet 
even in conquered cities, and to retain this na- 
tional worship. When, therefore, after centuries, 
the forces of Christian kings took possession of 
such cities as Toledo and Seville, which had 
-been under Moorish domination, they found 
churches of Christians who had been true to the 
cross in all these ages of darkness, and were 
still worshipping in the old forms. Meanwhile, 
however, under the predominant power, moral 
and physical, of the learned court of Charle- 
magne, the " Rite/' as it is called in the older 
theologians, of Italy had worked its way into the 
Northern churches. Among a people to whom 
the forms of religion meant pretty much the 
whole of it, there were therefore in contrast, not 
to say conflict, two rival " Rites " or forms. 

By hook and by crook, literally, the Mozara- 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 121 

bic form has now been driven out of all the Cath- 
olic churches of Spain excepting one little chapel 
in Toledo. It takes the name " Mozarabic," or 
" Muzarabic," from its having been used under 
the Arabic dynasties. But, Idyally enough, when 
the Spanish Protestants organized themselves for 
a worship independent of Rome, they drew upon 
the admirable resources of this ancient device for 
the prayers and forms of their national liturgy. 

The congregation around me at Seville seemed 
a body of devout people, men, women, and chil- 
dren, in much the same proportions which one 
would have found in New England, seriously en- 
gaged in what they had in hand. Strange to say, 
there was in the church and in the service none 
of the aspect of revolt or self-assertion which I, 
for one, have often seen in an assembly of Come- 
outers, and which I certainly expected in a Prot- 
estant church in Seville. I was led to think 
that they hardly knew that they were making 
any protest against the ecclesiastical power of 
the place, but rather that they came together for 
the pleasure of singing hymns in their own lan- 
guage, and the satisfaction of prayer in union, — 
a satisfaction which is practically almost denied 
to worshippers in Catholic churches, who only 
hear a prayer in a language which they do not 
understand and in which they unite with diffi- 
culty even in form, particularly when they cannot 



122 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

read, as is the case with most Spaniards. In 
short, it seemed to me that they were religious 
people, who were, very likely, adding to the some- 
what stereotyped formalities of the Catholic 
Church the pleasure and profit of closer com- 
munion with each other and with God which 
they found in worship in their own language. 

I stopped to speak with the priest after he had 
dismissed the congregation. He told me that on 
Sunday he never permitted himself to enter into 
discussion or controversy ; that he reserved all 
attacks on the Roman Church, or all justifica- 
tion of Protestantism, for his services on week- 
days. With a certain pride, which I am afraid 
I must call professional, he explained that on 
these week-day gatherings I should find a larger 
assembly than I had seen on Sunday. Alas ! I 
knew only too well that the chances are that 
more men will come to a fight than will meet to 
pray. But, all the same, I was more glad to have 
joined with his colony of glad and reverent wor- 
shippers than I should have been to hear his 
best knock-down confutation of the Pope or his 
satellites. 

In Granada, rightly or not, I came to the con- 
clusion that there was no effort at worship ex- 
cepting in the forms of the Roman Catholic 
Church. When Sunday came, therefore, we re- 
paired to the cathedral. I had taken the pre- 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN, 1 23 

caution to inquire, the day before, what might 
be the hour for service ; and to say truly, I do 
not think any one in our hotel, excepting us, 
knew or cared much when the time came. But 
it was spread abroad that a specially distin- 
guished preacher, Rev. Dr. Somebody, was to 
preach the sermon, while the cardinal-archbishop 
and his retinue were to administer High Mass. 
So we seemed likely to follow the direction of 
the dictionary people, and to " get the best" there 
was in that region by going there. 

Now, in what I have to say of this service I 
have no wish to offend Catholic susceptibilities. 
I have only the wish to say how such worship af- 
fects a person not trained to it, as it might affect 
a visitor from the planet Mars. With the Roman 
Catholic service in America I am, I believe, quite 
well acquainted. I have worshipped in some of 
the principal Roman cathedrals in Europe, and 
in I know not how many other churches of that 
faith. In Spain there are certain peculiarities 
which force themselves upon attention. I fancy 
they spring partly from the present attitude of 
the people to religion, and partly from the past 
power of the ecclesiastics. They force them- 
selves upon a stranger's attention as perhaps they 
do not upon officiating priests, who have seen 
the same thing since they were old enough to 
remember anything. 



124 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The architectural peculiarity of the Spanish 
cathedrals, as the reader should remember, is the 
presence of the Coro, or church within a church, 
such as I have spoken of at Burgos, at Cordova, 
at Seville, and such as is here at Granada again. 
We saw the same thing at Malaga and Cadiz. 
You have the large cathedral with its front of 
high pillars, and its lofty arches above. Within 
that you build a Coro in the middle. The walls 
do not quite reach the roof: they are high enough 
to seclude the people in it wholly from the sight 
of those outside, and what passes within cannot 
be well heard outside ; nor indeed is it meant 
to be. 

But it may be — as here at Granada — that 
one end of the Coro is parted from the other end, 
as in old ships the forecastle was parted from 
the stern, so that the layman on the floor of the 
cathedral may pass across the Coro from one 
side to the other. In this case there will be a 
rail, to prevent his straying either way within 
these sacred precincts. 

Inside the Coro are the high desks and prayer- 
books, the ranges of seats for priests, the altar, 
and the cabinet which contains the pyx, and, 
in short, everything which makes the church a 
church. Inside the Coro, accordingly, at Gra- 
nada, the company of the clergy assembled. 
From one end where they sat to the other end 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 125 

where they kneeled at the altar, they moved from 
time to time in procession. Once this proces- 
sion passed out into the larger cathedral, and all 
around the church in the aisles. This was indeed 
the most interesting ceremonial to me, because 
in fact the people — what there were of them 
— were there; and this was the only part of the 
ritual which recognized their existence or showed 
that anybody was interested in them. 

I will not discuss the ritual of the Church 
of Rome, or of its fitness for its purpose. 
But no person can compare a Catholic cathe- 
dral in America with a Catholic cathedral in 
Spain without a feeling that the Church of 
Rome has learned a lesson here which it needs 
to learn there ; or perhaps it would be better to 
say that The People is sovereign here, and that 
there is another Sovereign there. I suppose that 
if King Alfonso went to worship in the Cathe- 
dral of Granada, the magic gates of the Coro 
would fly open to him, and that he would find 
he was made as welcome as the priests. I 
am sure that in Boston, whoever went into the 
Catholic cathedral would be welcomed as if he 
were a worshipper, and would be made as wel- 
come as the priest. I am equally sure that the 
hundred people not priests who did attend the 
worship in Granada the day I was there were 
given to understand quite distinctly that they had 



126 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

no business there. While the great Coro was 
virtually empty, those people stood outside, un- 
less a mendicant offered a stool for their hire. 
Standing outside, they would be bidden to get 
out of the way of the procession when it came. 
One was reminded, indeed, of General Magru- 
der's phrase a few years after he left West Point. 
Worried by the necessities of an officer's duty, 
but not disliking either the compensation or the 
social attractions connected with it, Magruder 
said, " The army would be a very decent place if 
there were no privates. " It seemed clear enough 
that the ecclesiastics at Granada felt that their 
position would be much more tolerable if there 
were no people ! 

A considerable number of the clergy joined 
in the service, but I think it was only in this 
number that it differed greatly from the service 
to which we were accustomed. The day was 
Trinity Sunday. The preacher took the baptis- 
mal formula in Matthew for his text, as I have 
observed Trinitarian preachers often do when 
they preach this sermon ; for the sermon was 
the same in substance which I have often heard 
on such occasions. The misfortune of the text 
for their purpose is that it omits the essential 
words, " These three are one." 

This sermon is, of course, no argument for 
the doctrine of the Trinity. On the other hand, 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 127 

it concedes the point that the mystery is no 
matter of argument. And no man could have 
made this concession more frankly than our 
friend on Sunday. He began with a lamentable 
picture of the desperate state in which the world 
finds itself at this time. For this ruined condi- 
tion, more faith is the only cure, he said ; and, 
naturally, as the Trinity is the central doctrine 
of the Catholic Church, more faith in this was 
the recommendation of the sermon. There are 
men in Spain, however, as he knew, who draw 
the inference backwards. Since the Gothic Ari- 
ans were suppressed by fire and sword, the 
Roman Catholic Church has, without let or hin- 
drance, proclaimed this doctrine of the Trinity 
in Spain. If, after a thousand years, the result 
is such hostility to religion, such a failure in 
faith, such gross and beastly scepticism as he 
well described in the outset, may it not be that 
the Church has made a mistake in its central 
doctrine? By making a mystery of the Son, if 
he is the only means of revealing the Father, by 
making him the most unreal and incomprehensi- 
ble of beings, may not the Church have created 
precisely the irreligion which it deplores? To 
this question, of course, this sermon, wherever 
it is preached, never attempts any answer. But 
it certainly occurred to me that, in the country 
with which I am best acquainted, there is more 



128 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

real faith and more practical religion than there 
ever was ; that the fruit of religion is to be found 
riper and more abundant than in any period of 
past history ; and that that country is precisely 
the region of Christendom where the least is 
said about the mystery of the Trinity, and where, 
with the most success, Jesus Christ has been 
presented as a real being in history, made in all 
points as we are made who try to follow him. 

It is, alas ! the fault of all but the very best 
preaching that, just when the hearer longs for a 
square statement of truth, or, failing this, a bit 
of stiff logic, the speaker gives him, instead, an 
outburst of brilliant or lively rhetoric. My ad- 
mirable friend the canon, on this occasion, was 
not above the failing. But, granting this, let 
me hasten to add that the rhetoric was inspiring 
and well founded; and I well understood how 
he had won his laurels as a preacher. Best of 
all, the noblest passage of it was one with which, 
had he been wiser, he would have brought the 
sermon to an end. After all this playing up and 
down the scales, — after the explaining that the 
Trinity could not be explained, and that he would 
not explain it, and why he would not, which is 
the substance of this sermon wherever deliv- 
ered, — he said he had detained us long; and 
yet he begged for two words more. With an ad- 
mirable good sense, in a practice which belonged, 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 1 29 

I think, to Chrysostom's time, but has, alas ! 
died out from the American pulpit, he then gave 
us the refreshment of a pause before these two 
important words. He sat down. He took off 
his hat. He wiped his forehead. Those of us 
who were kneeling changed the knee. Those 
who were sitting on the floor changed their atti- 
tudes. Those who stood sat down. When all 
were thus prepared, he came forward again, and 
to my delight — as to that of any of the Ten- 
Times-One Club — it proved that the fruit of 
the two words was caridad, — " charity." Of 
what use all this dogmatic theology, which had 
occupied us this morning, as it had occupied 
the Church for centuries, without charity? Of 
what use this gorgeous ceremonial — nay, the 
most gorgeous ceremonial which man could con- 
ceive — without charity? In such a strain, we 
had at last the reality of religion, pure and un- 
defiled ; as simply and sweetly stated here under 
the arches of the cathedral as it could have been 
in a Friends' meeting in Narragansett. No ser- 
mon could have closed more grandly or fitly 
than this, had it closed there. 

So it shall close there for the present reader. 
After the second of his two words, he really 
finished ; and with some more adoration of the 
wafer, the several orders of priests filed out, and 
the service was ended. Of all this gorgeous 

9 



130 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

ritual, the grandest moment came then. It was 
when some sacristan, a hundred yards away, 
pushed open the great doors of the cathedral. 
Even from that distance a breath of fresh air 
swept up the naves and blew away the incense. 
The light of the sun itself, reflected from pure 
white walls, dimmed the candles. Every one of 
the remaining worshippers drew a long breath of 
the vital oxygen. And as thus the breeze and 
light and joy of heaven swept in upon us, the 
present Father revealed himself to us, his glad 
children, how certain, in such a blaze of his 
glory as waits on us when we leave the smoke 
and words and echoes of antiquity, — how cer- 
tain, as we stand under the open heavens, that 
he is, and is at hand ! 

The enormous wealth of the religious estab- 
lishments, of which the pomp and splendor of 
these cathedrals is the outward manifestation, 
has long attracted the jealousy of government, 
even when most willing to protect the rights and 
privileges of the Church. Any innovation would 
be regarded with distrust; and, in fact, I suppose 
Spain has not yet recovered from the shock of 
a change made half a century ago, when the real 
estate of the clergy was sold. The amount was 
so great, that a sale all at once proved impossible. 
In 1827 their annual income was calculated at 
a thousand million reals, or fifty million dollars. 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 131 

The revenue of the kingdom was estimated 
at four hundred million reals, or twenty million 
dollars, of which it was said almost fifteen mil- 
lions were realized. Of this sum the clergy 
themselves paid directly, it is supposed, not less 
than a third, besides their own share in the in- 
direct taxes, such as customs, excise, &c, so 
that they may fairly be considered as having 
paid half of the whole amount collected. The 
remainder, or about seven and a half millions of 
dollars, was obtained from the laity; and sup- 
posing the taxes to have equalled only a third of 
the revenue (a moderate calculation here), would 
have given a result of somewhere about twenty 
million dollars for the whole lay revenues of this 
kingdom, while those of the clergy amounted to 
fifty. 

We are apt to think the clergy of the Church 
of England comfortably endowed. But in some 
calculations of that time I find it is shown that 
the income of the Spanish clergy was three times 
that of the laity, on a basis of calculation which 
showed that the English laity had an income of 
thirty times that of the clergy. A desire to 
break up all those great properties played its 
part in all the Spanish revolutions. In 1835 
the landed possessions of the Church were at 
last confiscated, and in a very few years eighty 
million dollars worth were sold for the benefit of 



132 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

the State. Most of the convents were sup- 
pressed, and there are now fewer convents in 
Spain, in proportion to the population, than in 
most countries in Europe. 

In one of the chapels of the cathedral are 
the magnificent tombs of Ferdinand and of Isa- 
bella. Indeed, the chapel is almost a museum, 
so many curious articles are there which actu- 
ally belonged to these monarchs, and which have 
been preserved in memory of them. It is a com- 
fort to see and know the homage still paid to 
Isabella. Not in vain, indeed, that a woman is 
good and that she has the courage of her con- 
victions. I am tempted to compare her with 
Elizabeth in England, who had the courage of 
her convictions and was not good. Elizabeth's 
reign exalted England to her highest reputation, 
as Isabella's exalted Spain. Yet I do not think 
that any traveller in England ever stumbles on 
anything which indicates any popular memory 
of Elizabeth to-day. There are old ballads 
about good Queen Bess; but I do think that 
nobody sings them or remembers them now, 
because she was not good. She was clever and 
bright and strong and hateful, and now no- 
body loves her. But Isabella was clever and 
bright and strong and good, and everybody in 
Spain loves her and remembers her. 

Now, all through or over this desert of wick- 



WORSHIP IN SPAIN. 1 33 

edness and stupidity, running back for three 
centuries, men look at Isabella I., who tried to 
do good, wanted to do good, and on the whole 
succeeded. 

I do not remember at this moment any other 
instance of a crowned husband and wife, both 
named as one ruler, except that of William 
and Mary. In that case, poor Mary, I believe, 
always did what her warrior husband bade her 
do. Ferdinand was much more apt to do what 
Isabella thought best. She had the clearer head 
and much the better heart of the two 



CHAPTER IX. 

ACROSS THE SIERRA. 

FROM Granada to Madrid, which was to be 
our next home, a bird would fly almost exactly- 
north. He would cross Andalusia, La Mancha, 
and New Castile. But the railroads, to avoid 
the Sierra Rallo, follow the valleys of the Xenil 
and the Guadalquivir, so as to make, in fact, for 
a traveller going north, three sides of a square 
each sixty or seventy miles long. 

We preferred to take the diligence ride from 
Granada directly north to Jaen, which makes the 
fourth side of this square, and is perhaps sev- 
enty miles. To this determination I owed one 
of the pleasantest days of my life, — one of those 
golden expeditions upon which you afterwards 
always look back with delight ; a day in which 
everything seems to fit in with everything, and 
nothing goes wrong. Once for all, I may say 
that when, at half-past one, this charming ride 
was over, I left the driver's seat of the diligence 
with profound respect for Spanish administra- 
tion. We Yankees like to improve on things, 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 135 

but I had seen no detail in which I thought that 
business could be better done. 

The diligence leaves Granada at five in the 
morning, that as much work as possible may be 
done in the cool of the day. The amiable prac- 
tice of our stage-coaches of driving round to 
pick up passengers is wholly unknown. You 
start from a hotel, just as in Dickens's earlier 
stories you started from the cellar of the White 
Horse Inn. We had to breakfast at four at the 
Washington Yrving, that we might drive down 
in the old jumble-cart with our luggage. We 
had taken our seats a day or two before. I sat 
with the driver, called in Spain the mayoral, of 
course the best seat, which I obtained by feeing 
the " chief mate/' called the zagal, who, strictly, 
is entitled to it. I will try to show, as we go on, 
what became of him. Every other seat within 
and without was occupied, and we started with 
eight mules, handsome creatures, and full of 
spirit. We started with perfect punctuality, with 
the good wishes and admiration of a consider- 
able crowd of early loafers. The sun was just 
up, the air was fresh and exhilarating, and the 
day, of course, perfectly clear ; so we said fare- 
well, I am afraid forever, to our dear Granada 
and the lovely Alhambra. We were yet in the 
thickly built part of the town, as if, say, on 
Washington Street between Franklin and Black- 



136 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

stone Squares, when I noticed on the side of the 
street a little wigwam made of tall plants of 
Indian corn. While I was wondering, the watch- 
man came out, in a sort of military costume ; in 
this simple fashion did he provide himself with 
a not inconvenient guard-room. He was the 
first of a series of guards, who, from this point 
to Jaen, appeared every five kilometres, and 
saluted in military fashion, two at a station. 

At all the railway stations you see such peo- 
ple; they have cocked hats, and are in mili- 
tary dress. In Mr. Lathrop's series of letters in 
Harper, describing his tour through Spain, he 
gives, with thorough humor, the impression, 
which you cannot shake off, that it is always the 
same pair whom you see; that they have run 
on in advance, as the cat did before the King's 
carriage in Puss in Boots, and that they salute 
you as old friends, or, perhaps, as skilled detec- 
tives, who, like an ever-present conscience, dog 
you behind and keep on watch before, wherever 
you go or are. When I intimated to a Spanish 
friend that such people must cost the treasury a 
good deal, and asked if they did not make one 
reason why accounts did not balance better than 
they do, he asked whether I thought it better to 
have them looking round, or to have a company 
of brigands poking in their heads and pistols at 
the windows of the diligence. As, in point of fact, 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 1 37 

travel is so safe in Spain now that even English 
critics allow that a woman may go alone, where- 
ever she pleases, without danger though with- 
out escort, it must be admitted that this gens 
d'armes system has its advantages. I suppose 
the same gentlemen who would have been brig- 
ands sixty years ago may now enlist in this 
rural police, whose duties must be easy even if 
somewhat uneventful. 

For an hour or two our ride was across the 
level Vega; like riding through the bottom- 
lands of the Connecticut Valley. And here I 
obtained my practical knowledge of the details 
of irrigation, of which I have before spoken. 
The land is very fertile, the cultivation very 
high. A good deal of land is given to grapes, 
and I think it was in this valley that I saw some 
tobacco. But the culture of tobacco is frowned 
on by government, because they make money 
on the Cuban tobacco, which, I think, is a mo- 
nopoly in their hands. The night dews had 
laid the dust, and we bowled along perfectly 
steadily at the even rate of nine miles an hour, 
the mules always on a sharp, vigorous trot. 
About once an hour we took a new team of 
mules, stopping generally at what our West- 
ern friends would call " the most ramshackled 
hole that you ever did see." No one of these 
post-houses was like another; but, generally, a 



138 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

long stone building ran along close by the road- 
way. Mules came out of one door, and loafers, 
children, and women out of another. Every- 
body was delighted that the diligence had come. 
Everybody assisted in the preparations for its 
speedy departure. If you wanted a mug of 
water for the ladies, everybody was glad to fur- 
nish it; yet you were left with the impression 
that nobody ever drank water before or would 
again ; that you had introduced a queer Yankee 
notion into the place, and had broken the ripple 
of Andalusian life. I took it into my head that 
I would have a lanyard to my hat to keep it 
from blowing off. The general and frank inter- 
est of all parties was delightful. The messages 
sent, the hurried interlocutions, which resulted 
in the discovery of a bit of string two feet long, 
were most good-natured. Still, I clambered up 
to my seat, with the uneasy feeling that I had 
acted the part of a blustering Englishman, in 
insisting in introducing such foreign airs on an 
innocent rural population, till now quite igno- 
rant of the innovation. 

The harness is all rope, strong and well fit- 
ted for its use. The mules are generally har- 
nessed two abreast, though once or twice we 
had three in the first rank, with two poles. The 
leaders are directed by a postilion. He does 
not mount till they are at full speed. It is a 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 1 39 

point of pride to run at their side, and to spring 
up when the mule is in full motion. The " chief 
mate," as I called him above, sat on the thor- 
ough-brace, beneath my seat, which was prop- 
erly his, at the side of the driver. But he was 
not there a great deal. He varied his some- 
what cramped attitude by running by the side 
of the carriage and of the mules. He had a 
long whip, with which he touched anyone whom 
he or the driver thought negligent. The driv- 
ing, indeed, was conducted in a sort of caucus, 
in which my admirable friend on the right, the 
driver proper, this chief mate, whose official 
name I did not know, and the postilion, held 
equal parts, although the rank of each was 
firmly maintained. I mean that there was a 
running conversation, all the way, as to the suc- 
cess and prospects of the journey, and as to the 
condition and performance of the mules. On 
our seat we kept a store of Macadam stones, 
with which from time to time the driver hit head 
or haunch, as he chose, of a mule who needed 
reminding. One driver preferred stones as big 
as a peach, another had little ones not bigger 
than a nut. 

The whole staff smoked all the time that they 
could spare. So soon as we started from a 
post-house, the driver handed me the ribbons, 
and I drove for a few minutes. This was to 



140 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

give him a chance to make his cigarette. He 
had the tobacco, all ready, in one pocket and 
the paper in another. When the cigarette was 
made, I would furnish my match-box, he would 
take off his hat, and, with an ingenuity which 
I have never seen rivalled anywhere else, he 
would light the cigarette while we were in full 
motion. The chief mate would then climb up 
from his lair below, where he had been making 
his cigarette, and take a light for it. The pas- 
sengers on the seat above us did likewise, and 
we were thus ready for the rest of the stage, 
having occupied perhaps half a quarter of the 
time in preparation. When our end of the 
team was all well smoking, the postilion would 
jump off the leader, run back and get a light, 
run forward and mount again while the mules 
were at their regular pace; not but I have 
seen a postilion strike a match and light a cigar 
under the cover of his hat while he was in the 
saddle and in full motion. Indeed, one delight 
of this charming day was the feeling that at 
last in my life I saw two daily duties perfectly 
done, that of the postilion and that of the coach- 
man. 

The amount of conversation necessary would 
stagger the belief of taciturn readers like those 
who follow these lines. I do not remember that 
the mules had separate names, but we addressed 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 141 

to them a running fire of pleas, requests, sug- 
gestions, explanations, exhortations, encourage- 
ments, warnings, and possible adjurations, — 
though of this last I am not sure, — both in 
Andalusian and, oddly enough, in Arabic. Any 
language that they would understand would 
answer, so it kept them to their work. To say 
the truth, I never saw creatures who needed 
such prodding less. They kept on, pressed 
hard on the collar, at a relentless pace, as eager 
to be at the post-house as we were to have 
them. But on the part of our caucus, as I 
called it, of three, although they all did this thing 
every day of their lives, there was that sort of 
eagerness which you see in children going to a 
circus for the first time, — as if on that particu- 
lar day the doors would be closed earlier than 
usual ; as if we might find the bridge down at 
Jaen; or as if we were all bridegrooms going 
to be married. And this was accompanied by 
good nature almost ludicrous. I do not remem- 
ber to have heard an angry word spoken all that 
day. There was one occasion almost critical, in 
which a vicious mare was brought out as one of 
the leaders. The creature refused to start so 
obstinately that the whole team was once and 
again in confusion, — one mule was overthrown, 
— and I confess I thought another horse would 
have to be substituted for her. But the whole 



142 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

council, which included the grooms and the 
keeper of the post-house, maybe a dozen per- 
sons, managed the mad creature without the 
slightest show of hot temper. You might have 
thought she was a trout who would not bite, so 
quiet were they in their treatment of her, yet so 
determined. When she did start, the postilion 
ran by her side a mile before the wild creature 
would give him any chance to get on; all 
which he took more quietly than a boatman 
would take a breeze of wind. It helped the 
carriage along, and that was enough for him. 
When he was ready and she was ready, he took 
his place on her back, and we all went on as if 
nothing had happened. 

We are so determined to associate with Spain 
the ideas of bandits, contrabandists, guerillas, 
and pronunciamentos, and with Andalusia the 
memories of Gitanos and Gitanas, of Moors and 
sarabands and jaleos, that I, for one, was wholly 
unprepared to find these simple, rather grave 
people, in the management of mules and horses 
and diligences. The postilions had a little more 
of the air of the opera than these quiet Yankee- 
like men who held the places of captain and 
mate. But the whole enterprise gave to me a 
good deal the idea of a well-conducted cruise 
for fish, in which, under their auspices, we were 
going on shares. 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 143 

I have not yet mentioned the duties of the 
chief mate, and I find it difficult to describe 
them. But it is quite certain that there were 
duties, and that we should not have pulled 
through to Jaen had he not been there to dis- 
charge them. Where a driver of a street-car 
stops the car and goes forward to adjust the 
harness, the chief mate did it without stopping, 
while all parties were on the trot or the run. 
In any exigency where whipping was thought 
necessary by the caucus which directed, he ran 
to the guilty mule, and inflicted the chastise- 
ment, all still rushing on at this preordained 
pace of nine miles an hour. It is difficult for 
me, in writing of this afterwards, to imagine that 
a man can smoke while running a mile at that 
pace ; but the impression is strong on me that 
everybody smoked all the time. It was nothing 
to have him disappear. It was not that the 
wheel had passed over him, so that he was left a 
lifeless trunk on the road ; it was only that he 
had let the coach pass him, that he might run 
forward on the other side outside the off-leader, 
and give to him a bit of his mind. When the 
necessary chastisement had been inflicted, then 
he would again let the coach pass him, and re- 
appear on his nest on the thorough-brace. 

The strip of what I called bottom-land lasted 
for about one hour. Then we began to rise the 



144 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

sharp ascent of the Sierra Rallo, as I find it 
named on the maps. Nobody called it so on the 
spot, whom I heard. Perhaps this is as a con- 
ductor on Tom Scott's railroad might not speak 
of the Appalachian mountains. 

Here was another sight of that admirable en- 
gineering for which the Spanish officers have 
won deserved reputation, as applied to the build- 
ing of common (or uncommon) roads. Switzer- 
land has given to the world what are called 
models in bold zigzag roads, crossing high 
mountains at an even and low grade. But there 
is nothing in Switzerland which I have ever seen 
which exceeds the skill of the lines of this road, 
or which is kept in better order. So we steadily 
kept our relentless trot, though we were pulling 
up a mountain range, where we left far behind 
us the agriculture of the Vegas and found our- 
selves, at last, among small cedars and a kind of 
stunted wild olive-trees. At every five kilome- 
tres or so, one or two soldiers stepped out from 
their little house and saluted us. We touched 
our hats and hurried on. The population be- 
came very sparse, and there were post-houses, 
where it was clear enough that no one would 
have lived but to keep the mules and be ready 
for the diligence and other travellers. 

After we had crossed the ridge by a descent, 
which seemed to me as sharp, we followed down 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 145 

the valley of the river which passes Jaen. It is 
studded full with memorials of the raids of the 
old Moorish wars. A castle here, a broken 
bridge there, or a name familiar from Irving' s 
Granada, came in from point to point, to re- 
mind us of the past, in sharp contrast with 
the admirable road over which we bowled 
along, where, perhaps, those old marauders 
worked their way painfully on their hands and 
knees. 

One picture stands out in my memory of a 
little hamlet with church and post-house and a 
single narrow street of houses, built as close to 
each other as if they had been in Salutation 
Street at the North End of Boston. I stepped 
into a shop of general trade and seized some lit- 
tle loaves of bread, offering almost at random 
such copper coins as I supposed might answer 
in payment. The dealer picked out what he 
liked, and I carried my prize in triumph to the 
ladies, to serve as their almuerzo No. 2. Then I 
was to find something to drink. We were pro- 
vided with admirable little travelling jars for such 
purposes, made nowhere but in Spain and Mex- 
ico, I think. I ran to the picturesque fountain, 
and the matrons standing there at their daily 
gossip and work readily filled for me again and 
again. When I returned for the last time and 
gave them "a thousand thanks" in the pretty 

10 



146 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

Spanish phrase, I also gave a half-cent to the 
lady who had been most active. Really, she was 
as much amused as any leader of the fashion in 
Boston would have been had I offered her a half- 
cent on bidding good-by at the end of an evening 
party. She showed it to the others, and they all 
laughed merrily, and I was fain to laugh as well 
as I could as I retired. It was not my first nor 
my last lesson to teach me that I was not in a 
land of castes and vassals, where any man was 
willing to debase himself for a fee, but that 
we were, socially and politically, equals among 
equals in a land where everybody was willing to 
bear his brother's burdens. 

This matchless road over which we sped is 
an addition made within the last half-century to 
the resources of the country and the comfort of 
travellers. At every fine bridge, or at the open- 
ing of every tunnel, an inscription tells the trav- 
eller that it is the work of Her Majesty Queen 
Isabella II. I wish I thought that she in person 
had any more to do with it than I had. But it 
does mark, and many other things do, that in 
her reign, poor creature though she be, the 
regeneration of Spain began. Somebody drove 
these grand roads through, and, as is the habit 
of monarchies, she bears away the honors. 

As we approached Jaen the country opened 
out from the narrow mountain pass into another 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 147 

bit of what I have called " bottom-land, ,, in a 
convenient Western phrase. They showed the 
marks of tremendous inundations, as men 
would do if you were crossing the Hartford 
meadows. The sun was high by this time, and 
the dust was plenty, and we were glad when the 
towers and spires of Jaen, a most picturesque 
city, appeared, rising on a sort of ledge which 
surmounts and once commanded the valley. 

There is a feeling of surprise which an Ameri- 
can never gets over in the sudden transition 
from open country into what is or has been a 
walled town. You are prepared for Boston, 
when you come into it from whatever direction, 
by miles upon miles of suburbs, and so of almost 
any American city ; but in these historical cit- 
ies the walls meant defence and safety, while to 
live outside the walls meant almost as certainly 
insult and injury. At this day, therefore, the 
Spanish government attempts to persuade peo- 
ple to live at a distance from towns by reducing 
their taxes by a sliding scale, in proportion to 
such distance. If you live five kilometres from 
a town, a third of your land tax is taken off; at 
eight kilometres, two-thirds ; and at ten kilome- 
tres, the whole. Such, I think, are the propor- 
tions, writing from memory. I am certain that 
such is the principle of the provision. 

Jaen is a capital of a province of the same 



148 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

name of three or four hundred thousand people. 
In the Moorish times it was a rich and indepen- 
dent kingdom. I learn from Malte-Brun that it 
is divided into five districts. When seen from a 
distance, it looks like a town of forty thousand in- 
habitants, though the population hardly reaches 
half that number. This illusion is due to the 
sight of several large buildings, a magnificent 
cathedral, built in the form of a Latin cross, on 
the site of an ancient mosque, fourteen con- 
vents, twelve parish churches, and several hos- 
pitals. 

The streets are wider and more direct than 
we were used to in these southern cities, and the 
whole aspect of the place is pleasant, though 
very quiet. 

Some other cities, of which we saw a part 
of one in the distance, are Ubeda, Baeza, and 
Martos. Of these, here are some guide-book 
narratives : — 

Ubeda, an Arabic town between the Guadal- 
quivir and the Guadalimar, stands on a decliv- 
ity surrounded by mountains and mountain 
passes; it has its woollen manufactures, and 
carries on a considerable trade in horses, which 
are much valued throughout Spain. Baeza, the 
ancient Beatia, rises on a height; the surround- 
ing country is said to be very healthy. 

Martos, supposed to be Tucci Colonia, is com- 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 1 49 

manded by a very high rock. From this rock 
Ferdinand the Fourth threw two brothers named 
Carvagal, who were accused, although without 
any justice, of having murdered a knight of the 
family of Benarides. The brothers in vain de- 
clared their innocence, and, according to the 
local tradition, while they were rolling from 
stone to stone, a voice was heard calling to Fer- 
dinand to appear on a certain day at the judg- 
ment seat of God. On that day Ferdinand died, 
at Jaen. 



These sketches are not written to tell what we 
had for dinner. But one would be a brute to 
say nothing of the pretty welcome at the post- 
house at Jaen, where we landed from the dili- 
gence after our ride. And if I can give a 
notion of the readiness to oblige which every 
one showed, it will, in a fashion, explain to the 
reader why we look back on Spain so happily. 

I am disposed to think, from the guide-books 
and other authorities, that there are larger and 
grander hotels in Jaen than the post-house. 
But the people who helped us down from our 
airy perches and explained about the trains 
seemed cheerful and hospitable. We were dusty 
and hot; the house was neat and cool. Who 



ISO SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

were we, to go hunting for Delmonico's or the 
Vendome of Jaen, if indeed any such place there 
be? Following that suggestive scripture which 
directs us not to go from house to house, we 
e'en stayed where we were. The traps were 
brought from the street and placed in the cool 
patio, if, by good luck, the loyal reader remem- 
bers what that is. A room was found for the 
ladies and another for me. A pitcher of water 
and a bowl and a towel were brought to mine, a 
little as if they were unusual luxuries, I confess; 
and then we found ourselves assembled in a 
dark cool room on the ground floor, a room 
without windows which we should call windows, 
but opening upon the patio by large open doors, 
or what I think our Saxon ancestors would have 
called " wind-doors. " Little wind, however, I 
fancy, ever crosses that secluded patio or tries 
the passage of those doorways. 

The whole thing throws you back eighteen 
hundred years ; or if you choose to stop on the 
green settees in the old Latin school, with dear 
Mr. Dillaway explaining to you his own book of 
Roman Antiquities, it throws you back about 
fifty years. For, simply, you are in what the Ro- 
mans called a triclinium, and outside is what they 
called an atrium ; and the whole business of the 
atrium and the impluvium is here as clear as in 
most school-books it is unintelligible. And if the 



A CR OSS THE SIERRA . 151 

Beckers and Mansfields, who write the books, 
had condescended to come to Spain, when they 
did go to Pompeii, they could see people living 
very much as the woman lived who made the 
salad in Virgil's Culex, if, as I believe, it were 
Virgil's. Instead of that they go to Pompeii, 
where the wooden parts of the buildings are 
very much charred, and the people who lived in 
them are not now able to explain their methods 
of living. Why Roman architecture should be 
better preserved in Spain than in Italy, this 
deponent sayeth not, because he does not know. 

Let the loyal reader understand, then, that a 
triclinium is a dining-room, and that we were in 
one. 

Neat napkins and cloth, neat glass and plates, 
cool fruit, fresh celery and the rest, and such 
willing, cheerful attendance ! One could dis- 
pense with a printed menu, and could be satis- 
fied with only five courses. For one, I do not 
know whether the meal were a late almuerzo or 
an early comida. I was hungry, and ate; an6 
that was the principal affair. 

As for the cathedral of Jaen, we took it on 
trust. I have no doubt it is all that Malte-Brun 
says it is, and very possibly more. 

Another jumble-cart to the station, and then a 
short ride northward, by a somewhat broken- 
winded railway, to the great Northern Line, 



152 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

where we were to be picked up by an express 
train late in the afternoon. The adjective broken- 
winded does not apply in any sort to the loco- 
motive, which did its work very well, and was, 
I dare say, of good English build; but it at- 
tempts to convey that quality of uncertainty and 
general indifference to the object possible, which 
belongs to any enterprise which succeeds only 
partially in its objects, and certainly does not 
make frequent dividends. A first-class car is 
always the same thing, as far as my experience 
in Europe goes ; and I always find it easy to 
make my travel fast enough, by the simple plan 
of imagining the kilometres to be miles. In 
point of brute fact, as this reader ought to know, 
a kilometre is about 394-5 28ths of a mile. But 
who cares for the mere fact, when he can fill in 
the short mile with the stores of Spanish fancy. 
Arrived at the trunk line, we had an hour or 
two to spend at the station, as so many other 
passengers had. The unfailing sketch-books 
appeared, and there was no lack of resources. 
There were hens to feed with bits of biscuit, shy 
children to tempt with preserved ginger, sugared 
water at a half-cent a glass to sip for refresh- 
ment, and groups wildly picturesque to be pre- 
served for after compositions, if only the flying 
pencil could preserve them before they dissolved 
themselves away. 



ACROSS THE SIERRA. 1 53 

A stone's-throw from the road was what would 
have been a shanty here, or in France, I suppose, 
a chiente\ if, as I have always suspected, our 
Irish word " shanty " meant, originally, a " ken- 
nel," or hut for the canaille. In Spain the hut 
was made of corn-stalks. Whether no one lived 
in it in winter, or whether in winter it is not 
cold there, I do not know. Nor do I know what 
clothes its inmates wear in winter ; but in June, 
when the weather is warm in the edge of Anda- 
lusia, there appeared from it first a young gen- 
tleman in the costume he was born in, then 
another in a picturesque shirt, both as indiffer- 
ent to their lack of apparel as were the hens 
and the dogs with which they were playing. 
It was the costume which the climate suggested, 
and this was enough. When, after an hour, 
the mother returned from some out-door work, 
which, like most Spanish women, she had been 
engaged in, — so far are Mrs. Howe's and Mrs. 
Blackwell's views carried out in this happy coun- 
try, — she drove the naked children before her 
into the house, and we saw them no more. 

Such freedom was, I suppose, Roman, and it 
accounts for the simplicity of costume in the 
classical gems and statues. 

At last the train comes sweeping along. Ho ! 
for Madrid. A sunset which one will always 
remember, but of course can never describe ! 



154 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

So we swept through La Mancha, looking vainly 
after dark for Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. 
At Alcazar they waked us after midnight, and, 
just as we had done three weeks before, we ate 
or drank our chocolate, and bought our knives 
of the man who sells them for murderers. The 
sun rises early in June, and by daylight, a lit- 
tle after four, we could see Madrid on our 
horizon. 



CHAPTER X. 

MADRID. 

We passed not far from a little church which 
is said to have been built at the geographical 
centre of Spain. It is three or four miles from 
the city. How they find the geographical centre 
I do not know. It is one of the most delicate of 
geometric problems. 

Between five and six we arrived at the station, 
which is quite out of town, and were carried, 
bag and baggage, through silent streets on a 
Sunday morning to the Hotel Russia. Here I 
had seen the landlord when I was in Madrid be- 
fore, and from Seville and Granada I had writ- 
ten engaging rooms, which he had assured me 
should be ready when I wrote. At the hotel, 
alas ! this morning, no one w r as stirring. With 
great difficulty a porter was found who found 
the landlord, and it then proved that he had re- 
ceived no letter and that he had made no provi- 
sion for us. It is not what we call a hotel, but 
virtually an apartment house, where we had 
promised ourselves something like home life 
while we stayed. 



156 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

Everybody apologized; but all were quite 
sure that we should be well pleased with the 
apartments at the Hotel Something Else, to 
which accordingly we jumbled in the omnibus, 
which is one of a class which has been suffi- 
ciently described. 

But here they were no more awake than at the 
other house. The apartments were entirely un- 
satisfactory, and I was now in despair. I was 
about to go to the great Hotel de la Paz, where 
we had been before, to spend Sunday, and thence 
begin the hunt for lodgings, when, as if he had 
been an angel from heaven, appeared on the 
sidewalk the excellent Ricci. 

" Was the senor in search of lodgings?" 

That was exactly what the senor was in search 
of. 

" Did the senor wish the meals for his party 
provided with the lodgings? " 

That also was the wish of the senor's heart, 
and expressed itself in indifferent Castilian. 

If, then, the senor would direct the driver of 
the jumble-cart to carry the ladies only a limited 
stone's-throw, really a distance so small that 
the ladies might walk, were not the jumble-cart 
there with the luggage, friend Ricci was sure that 
his lodgings, which were all ready for travellers, 
would meet the exact wishes of the senor and the 
ladies. 



MADRID. 157 

Well, — the whole suggestion was so absurd, — 
it was so unlikely that this particular man, who 
in a desolate street, before the town was alive, 
had seen us drive up to a desolate hotel, should 
be anything but a sharper ; it was so grossly im- 
probable that the quarters he had to show should 
be other than noisome, if, indeed, the whole 
were not a den of thieves, that I was at first 
disposed to dismiss him and his, with any Cas- 
tilian expression which might mean that he had 
best tell so preposterous a story to any marines 
of his acquaintance. But, on the other hand, it 
seemed idle not to " try the adventure/' as we 
were in search of adventures. The grumbling 
coachman, the porter, even the people at the 
Hotel Something Else joined in eulogies of 
Ricci's character and position, which, as it after- 
wards proved, he wholly deserved. I entered 
the omnibus once more. A minute brought us 
to the excellent Ricci's. Five minutes more 
showed that the apartments, though not palatial, 
were sufficient, and, before half an hour was 
over, we were comfortably at home in the rooms 
which we occupied all through our stay in 
Madrid. 

Whether it is the custom in Madrid for lodg- 
ing-house keepers to stand at the corners of 
the street looking for lodgers, as a man might 
stand at a pool in Mad River, looking for a 



158 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

trout below a shady bank, and whether they 
usually obtain their customers by these personal 
interviews, I do not know. Maybe such is their 
custom. Maybe it is the custom in other cities. 
Possibly it is the custom in Boston, where I 
never have had to engage lodgings for myself. 
There is a certain convenience about the plan, 
when it works as well as it did in our case, par- 
ticularly in a country where the postal arrange- 
ments fail as often as they do in Spain. I came 
to have a thorough respect for Ricci, — whom I 
have called " the excellent," — as a man who 
was honest, not above his business, and under- 
stood it very well. 



From this moment our expedition involved 
regular hours and work. For me, the archives ; 
for the ladies, the galleries. These public offi- 
ces — that is what they all are — are opened 
with great liberality ; of course at certain speci- 
, fied hours, with which one has to comply. I do 
not know what are the Spanish Civil Service 
regulations. I do know that they have very 
civil men on duty, and very intelligent ones 
withal. The ladies must give their own results 
of work in the galleries ; and, in some other 
form, I must give the result of mine in various 



MADRID. 159 

archive rooms. It may be of use to some- 
body else if I tell here what collections there 
are. 

The government has made two or three ef- 
forts, from time to time, to collect its treasures 
for American history, and to arrange them. 
Every scholar knows what are the dangers of 
such efforts. Lacon says of newly converted 
saints, that they are like newly made roads; 
that the eventual result may be an improve- 
ment, but that, at the moment of transition, the 
new result is not more agreeable to the traveller 
or the bystander than the state of things exist- 
ing before. I have had a similar impression 
when I was in a public library, where the new 
librarian had destroyed the old arrangement and 
had not yet ordered his books in a new one ; 
and to say truth, in a changing world, this is 
often the condition of a public library. 

The American papers in Spain have been 
moved about a good deal in this way, and there 
is some confusion in consequence. But there 
are scholars of the first rank who have acquaint- 
ed themselves with the Law of the Instrument, 
and I found no jealousy among these gentle- 
men, but the most eager willingness to facilitate 
research. 

The great collection at Simancas, not a 
great way from Valladolid, was begun in 1566, 



160 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

when they had begun to find out the priceless 
value of everything relating to America. As 
one feature of Napoleon's conquest of Spain, 
this great collection, or a large part of it, was 
carried to Paris. Even when other spoils were 
returned, a part of it remained there, and it was 
only with difficulty that it was obtained again. 

From this collection and others a considera- 
ble part has been transferred to Seville, where 
the department of the Indies for a long time 
held its seat. 

Meanwhile, each department at Madrid (as 
those of War and of Marine especially) has its 
share of documents, belonging to its own ser- 
vice, which have never been transferred to either 
of these great collections ; or, having been trans- 
ferred there, have found their way back again. 
I was not able to work at the Library of the 
War Department. But in the Hydrographical 
Bureau I found admirable catalogues and the 
most courteous and intelligent assistance. 

The Royal Library occupies I know not how 
many elegant rooms on the first floor of the pal- 
ace. I think it must be the most elegant large 
library in the world. It contains between one 
and two hundred thousand books, which I 
shall best describe if I ask the reader to imag- 
ine that for two hundred years an intelligent 
librarian has been buying and binding hand- 



MADRID. l6l 

somely, year by year, for an intelligent king, an 
average of seven hundred books a year, of the 
most interesting publications of Europe, and, in 
these latter years, of America. In the admirable 
Bibliographical Room I was well pleased, when, 
to answer a question of mine, the accomplished 
chief turned, as if to the most handy authority, 
to the well-known Boston Library Catalogue of 
the Ticknor collection. 

The National Library is much larger than the 
Royal Library, which is, in fact, the private 
library of the palace. Of its value as a collec- 
tion I cannot speak, but they had many more 
manuscripts in my line than I could even ask 
for or look at cursorily. 

I have left to the last the singularly conven- 
ient work-rooms of the Academy of History. 
For practical purposes, strange to say, the 
American workman will best begin here. It is 
somewhat as an intelligent student of Massachu- 
setts history in Boston would establish himself, 
if he might, in the Historical Library, particu- 
larly if he had Mr. Deane and Dr. Greene at 
hand to coach him minute by minute, and then 
would make forays when he wanted to consult 
originals, say to the State House or to Cam- 
bridge or to the Antiquarian Library. 

At the Academy they have, in nearly one hun- 
dred volumes, the manuscript collections made 

ii 



1 62 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

by Munoz in the last century for his History of 
America. Of this history, only the first volume 
was published; but Munoz had been engaged 
for some forty years in collecting his materials. 
He had full access to the Simancas and to the 
Seville collections. He must have had at his 
orders a considerable staff of copyists. He 
began his work by copying, in full, in most 
cases, the most important documents. These 
made up the collection in the Academy. Now, 
of course, whatever luck the American traveller 
might have, whether at Simancas or at Seville, 
in overhauling papers, he could not expect in 
his vacation to have as good a chance at the 
best plums as Munoz had in his forty years. So 
a man will be wise to look through the Munoz 
volumes, early in his work, and see what there 
is there which he has not seen before. 

Buckingham Smith has been before him. 
Many, if not most, of the curious papers in his 
volume of collections are in the Munoz collec- 
tion. Lately the Spanish government has pub- 
lished two collections of " Documentos Ineditos," 
— documents which till then had been uned- 
ited, — one of general history and one of the his- 
tory of the Indies. This last has special interest 
for Americans, and all our larger public libra- 
ries should have it; there are thirty-four vol- 
umes. Many of these papers also are in Munoz. 



MADRID. 163 

But I found a good deal there which was quite 
new to me. In particular, there is a running di- 
gest of those documents which Mufioz did not 
copy, which is a sort of index to papers, and 
gives one a hint of what is yet to be searched 
for. 

The congress of " Americanists/' all men in- 
terested in American history, met last year in 
Madrid. The mere catalogue of the documents 
brought together for their inspection, and the 
museum of curiosities contributed by individuals 
and by departments, makes the mouth water. 
" Have you seen Ferdinand and Isabella's auto- 
graphs?" said a gentleman to me one day, as 
he was turning over a volume of letters and 
lighted on one accidentally. And another sug- 
gested that in such a place I should find Cor- 
tes's letters in the original. You become used 
to such " finds " or nuggets. But when you 
read on one single page such a string of titles 
as the catalogue of the Americanista Museum 
gives, you wish you had been in Spain a year be- 
fore. It was what we call a loan exhibition, and 
it will be, I suppose, a long time before such 
rarities are brought together under one roof 
again. 

The catalogue begins with illustrations of 
primitive American civilization, — seventy uten- 
sils of stone, fifty-one of copper or brass, several 



1 64 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

paintings, and more than one hundred sculp- 
tured busts, statues, and idols. 

There were more than two hundred articles 
of clothing and nearly two hundred weapons. 
There were more than six hundred vases and 
other ceramics. 

Of other articles grouped together under the 
general head of Mobiliario were nearly four 
hundred objects, such as instruments of music 
or pieces of furniture, or other manufactures of 
American ingenuity. 

M. del Valle, the accomplished librarian of 
the Royal Library, showed to me the most beau- 
tiful and costly book I ever saw, which has, 
however, an interest far beyond any worth of 
jewels or gold. The casket itself showed that 
something precious was within. The book, as 
large as the small quarto Bible known as 
" Cheyne's edition," blazes with gold and jew- 
els, between which the rich leather of the cover 
appears, just enough to show that the traditions 
of leather binding are preserved. Within is a 
missal, elegantly printed by hand on vellum, 
richly gilt and decorated. Where a king or 
queen is represented in the picture, a portrait 
of Isabella I., or of Ferdinand, or of some other 
sovereign of their time, appears. The wise 
men at Bethlehem are, I think, in like manner, 
portraits. 



MADRID. 165 

But the value of the beautiful book turns on 
the inscription, which tells its history in letters 
of gold on what was once a blank fly-leaf. 

FERDINANDUS et ELISABET, piisimi Reges, 

Sacrum hunc librum 

Indi9 gazae primitiis ornarunt. 

"Ferdinand and Isabella, those most devout sovereigns, 
adorned this sacred book with the first fruits of the Indies. ,, 

The book was made for their grandson, 
Charles the Fifth, and the very first gold which 
Columbus brought from the islands is that 
which you see to-day in its decoration. From 
Charles the book descended to Philip IV., who 
gave it as a present to a favorite cardinal, and 
from him or his it returned to the Royal Li- 
brary. 

Charles the Fifth has, on the whole, done the 
world as much harm as any man who has lived 
in it for a thousand years. Yet such a grand- 
mother hoped for him and gave to him his 
prayer-book ! If only he himself had cared to 
pray, or had known for himself and his duty 
in the world what prayer is ! 



CHAPTER XI. 

SPANISH POLITICS. 

I HAVE said nothing, so far, of Spanish poli- 
tics, partly for the excellent reason which Cousin 
gave for neglecting Buddhism in his lectures on 
philosophy. 

"At this point in these lectures I should 
speak on Buddhism," he said. " But I do not, 
because I know nothing about it." 

You cannot help being interested in politics, 
though you be a wayfaring man in the condition 
in which a wayfaring man is apt to find himself; 
for all the Spaniards are, or seem to be, wild 
about their political condition. They are in that 
early stage of constitutional development which 
we have happily passed, when even sensible peo- 
ple think that almost everything depends on the 
central administration. To that stage belongs a 
love of discussion which becomes even absurd. 
And in these days of cheap ink and paper and 
steam-press work, there results to such a nation 
a flood of newspapers. All of these are small, 
almost all poor ; all are violent in their attacks 



SPANISH POLITICS. 1 67 

on other journals and on the people whom the 
editors do not like; and the streams of satire, 
invective, and strained wit would have seemed 
absurd, even in Little Peddlington or in Eatan- 
swill. Every day, as I may have said before, at 
least one large colored cartoon is printed by one 
or another of the comic papers. These make 
quite a little picture-gallery at the news-shops 
for those who cannot read. These are, alas! 
four-fifths of the population. 

How three million readers can support so 
many newspapers I cannot understand. I have, 
somewhere, a memorandum of the number of 
dailies printed in Madrid, and their daily circula- 
tion. There are, I think, at least ten different 
papers, and the aggregate circulation must come 
nearly up to that of our eight Boston dailies. 
They are very small, poorly printed on poor 
paper. The price is one cent for the smallest, 
two cents for the larger and better, and three 
cents for those which have a colored cartoon. 
These colored pictures are very well printed, 
quite as well as " Puck's. " Sometimes they are 
very funny, sometimes to a traveller wholly 
unintelligible, and sometimes, as I said in 
speaking of Seville, fairly blasphemous. It had 
never before occurred to me that there would 
be a better sale for such pictures in a country 
which cannot read, than in one that can. 



1 68 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The reader must remember that the popula- 
tion of Madrid and that of Boston are nearly the 
same, when I ask him to compare thus the 
newspaper circulation of the two cities. The 
population is the same; but while in Boston 
almost everybody can read, as we know even 
from the Governor's message, only one-fifth of 
the Spaniards can, on the average of the king- 
dom. And I am afraid that of those who do 
read, most read very little and very ill. 

The key to the convictions of readers and non- 
readers was given to me by a cynical neighbor 
at the hotel in Seville. His epigram was this : — 

" There are in Spain fifteen million people, 
and they hold fifteen million and one opinions 
in politics." 

I am disposed to think that this is substan- 
tially true. The real population is sixteen mil- 
lion eight hundred thousand. There are quite 
as many opinions. If, as I fear, most of them 
are still in that mood which gives any attention 
to the constant shriek and howl and sneer of the 
short-paragraph makers of the dailies, — even 
more foolish and worthless than the perpetual 
snarl of our third-rate Washington correspon- 
dent at home, — you can see that the chances 
are poor for anything like a calm consideration 
of the position. 

This is one side of the problem of Spanish 



SPANISH POLITICS. 169 

politics, as it strikes an ignorant traveller, look- 
ing wholly from the outside. 

Please to remember, however, how the prob- 
lems of American politics would strike a trav- 
eller here, who could talk little English, and 
who steadily bought half a dozen papers a day 
of all sorts, with no original knowledge of the 
distinction between the " New York Herald " 
and the " Bird of Freedom Screecher," and who 
read them all conscientiously as he travelled 
from city to city. All I can say is, that if I am 
as ignorant of Spanish politics and the Spanish 
press as the last distinguished English poet whom 
I talked with in America was of ours, this loyal 
reader had better skip to the beginning of the 
next chapter. From the nature of the case, the 
traveller feels the mosquito bites, is annoyed 
by the flies, and hears the screeching of the 
crickets and frogs in a new country. From the 
nature of the case, also, he is not admitted for 
very long conferences with the real leaders of 
opinion and life, who are probably much too 
busy to talk with him, and are probably much 
too wise and reticent to be talking a great deal 
with anybody. Let the intelligent reader re- 
member this, and let him ask himself, if he be 
really intelligent, exactly how much stock he 
takes in the snarling or the pessimism of third- 
rate newspapers at home. 



170 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

If you trusted the newspapers, you would say 
that there was only one man in Spain, or possi- 
bly two, who wanted Sagasta, the present Prime 
Minister, to stay in, and that this one was Sa- 
gasta himself; that the other was possibly his 
confidential private secretary. You would say 
that everybody else was wild to have such an 
absurd pretender pushed from his throne, and 
every morning you would be sure that he would 
have fallen the next day, and that he would be 
at once forgotten. 

In point of fact, " as it seems to me " (as dear 
old Nestor used to say), Sagasta is one of the 
ablest men in Europe, — the sort of man who will 
be spoken of, by and by, by the side of Cavour. 
I had no opportunity of talking politics with the 
King. He was very much engaged while I was 
in Madrid, and so was I. But I think that he 
has as high an opinion of Sagasta as any of us 
can form. And I think the King is a remarkable 
young man, and that if he can hold on for five 
years longer, as he has for the last eight, he will 
be counted, not only as one of the wisest sover- 
eigns in Europe, but as one of the wisest of the 
nineteenth century. 

When Sir Robert Peel was speaking of Louis 
Philippe after his death, he said, " He was the 
most distinguished ruler who has filled the 
throne of France " — and there he paused. The 



SPANISH POLITICS. 171 

House listened expectant, and Sir Robert closed 
the sentence by saying, " since the fall of Napo- 
leon. " It was not much to say that poor Louis 
Philippe was more distinguished than those fag- 
end Bourbons whom he followed. Alas ! it is less 
to say that this young man has already, in eight 
years, shown more wisdom than all his ancestors 
together have shown in three centuries and a 
half since Isabella died ; for, simply, they have 
shown none. I do not know if his head rests 
uneasy; but I should think he might feel that 
Spain has had, since he was on the throne, the 
best eight years which she has had in a century, 
or, indeed, in two. 

As I have intimated, the King seems disposed 
to stand by Sagasta, and to give him and his 
the best chance possible. Of the King, the first 
story which every one tells you is this, that 
when he was asked to take the crown, being 
indeed the heir to his abdicating or abdicated 
mother, Isabella the Bad, his answer was, " Yes, 
I will come if you wish. Only, when you 
want me to go, tell me so, and I will go. Re- 
member, all along, that I am the first republican 
in Europe," It seemed to me, all along, that I 
saw the signs of a people pleased that they had 
for a king a man whom they were not obliged to 
have, and yet who had not canvassed for the 
place. It is the difference between having a 



172 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

mayor like Josiah Quincy, who you know never 
asked to be mayor, and does not want to be if 
people do not want him, and having somebody 
who has been pulling wires and packing caucuses 
for the nomination. In my theory of the situa- 
tion, the King sees Sagasta's wisdom, and knows 
that absolutely all they require is peace among 
themselves, and that then the good climate, good 
soil, good blood, and good race, which at San 
Diego's request the good God gave to Spain, 
will pull Spain through. 

What would you do, if you could? I have 
always found this a good question to put to my- 
self in any exigency, or in any new situation. 
It clears the sky a good deal if you can answer 
it. To find out what is the ideal best thing is a 
great help. Sitting in the gallery of the cham- 
ber, and reading the newspapers in that conven- 
ient club-house commonly called a street-car, I 
often turned over this question in Spain, — what 
would I do, if, by accident, the King put me in 
Sagasta's place. You have this enormous debt 
saddled on your nation. It is stated in the 
Gotha Almanac as $2,583,000,000, and in Cham- 
bers's Cyclopaedia as $1,875,000,000. The two 
estimates are only $708,000,000 apart; and I 
am afraid that it is not of very much conse- 
quence which account the reader takes, if he 
only takes in the idea that the debt is enormous, 



SPANISH POLITICS, 1 73 



a 



anyway." The poor fellows managed to pay 
upon it, in 1880, $57,897,225 by way of interest. 
It may instruct the American reader to compare 
this payment with that which the United States 
made on its interest account last year. We paid 
$71,077,206, and we thought that to be a good 
deal. Remember that Spain has but 16,800,000 
people and that we have 50,000,000. 

Their army expenses in 1880 were $22,000,000, 
and their naval expenses $6,000,000. Our army 
last year cost us $43,000,000, — but this in- 
cluded harbor improvements,- — and our navy 
$15,000,000. Their " public works" cost them 
$15,000,000. These added to the army expenses 
would make up $37,000,000, — still not up to our 
figures, for three times as many people. I do 
not see, therefore, that an American has any 
right to say that in these things their govern- 
ment charges are excessive. 

If their army expenses seem high, it must be 
remembered that they have Cuba and the Phil- 
ippine Islands to take care of, for better for 
worse, for richer for poorer. 

When Mr. Alexander Everett was our minis- 
ter to Spain, rather more than fifty years ago, 
he proposed that they borrow $100,000,000, 
without interest, from the United States, paya- 
ble at their pleasure (not at ours), and to give as 
pledge or mortgage for it the island of Cuba. 



174 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

In his letter to Mr. Clay explaining this pro- 
posal, he said that they would never sell Cuba, — 
Spain was quite too proud. On the other hand, 
if we held it in pledge, we should have the over- 
sight of the government, which is all we should 
want, under our system. We should also have 
the customs revenue under our tariff, whatever 
that tariff might be. 

He did not say, but I say, that we should have 
free sugar. Some people would like that, how- 
ever it might affect my Louisiana friends. 

It would also be a good while before Spain 
would ask to have Cuba returned, or would care 
to pay off the mortgage. Any way, it would 
relieve both sides of the Spanish budget. 

I was present at one of the great field-days 
in the Cortes, or Chamber of Deputies. The 
debate was upon the subject of a re-arrange- 
ment of the judicial system, but the occasion 
had been seized upon by the opposition for an 
attempt to split the government, and the result 
was looked for with great interest by everybody. 
Trial by jury has never, for any long time, been 
part of the judicial arrangement in Spain. The 
present ministry, or at least a portion of them, 
had at the time of their election given promise 
to the people of a new attempt to incorporate 
the jury among the other institutions. The ex- 
periment has been tried several times before, 



SPANISH POLITICS. 1 75 

but each time, through unfortunate circum- 
stances, the system has had no chance to live. 
To carry out their promise, then, the ministry 
introduced a re-arrangement of the whole judicial 
system, a part of the scheme being the introduc- 
tion of the jury. Through some disagreement 
on the government side, real or supposed, the 
opposition had seized upon the question as a 
test point, and the occasion was taken by nearly 
everybody to speak, to define his position in 
matters of importance generally. The govern- 
ment, as a matter of fact, held together firmly, 
and the opposition was not wholly united against 
it, so that the occasion, being such an over- 
whelming victory for Sagasta and the ministry, 
was really little more than a very brilliant de- 
bate, in which I had the opportunity of hearing 
almost all the speakers of note in the Chamber 
of Deputies. 

It is a very orderly assembly indeed, more so 
than any of the sort that I ever saw before, ex- 
cept, perhaps, our own Massachusetts House of 
Representatives. They transact business quickly 
and without unnecessary disturbance, pay careful 
attention to what is going on, and generally try 
to get through the work in hand as well as they 
possibly can. The whole scene had a dignity 
and decorum quite in keeping with Spanish 
character. The speeches were, as a rule, cour- 



176 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

teously made, and were heard attentively. The 
whole Chamber listened carefully, and applauded 
the parts of the speech which seemed good. 
The speaker, Herrera, a man of experience, held 
the House well in hand, and maintained the 
most admirable order. 

The Cortes is a young-looking assembly, far 
younger than the legislative bodies of England, 
France, or of our own country. The members 
speak with perfect ease. I observed no notes 
used at all. They claim the floor in advance, so 
that the president calls up the speakers from a 
list which he has by him, thus avoiding much 
disturbance. 

It would be hard to persuade me that the dif- 
ficulty in the new birth of Spain is to be found 
in any fundamental deficiency in the Spanish 
people. It will probably prove true that they 
must work through the fatal passion for talk, 
which, as I have said, seems to be upon them 
now. They must work out their salvation, and 
not talk it out. If it is true, however, that sixty 
per cent of the whole surface of the kingdom is 
under cultivation, — and these figures are given 
with authority, — they are certainly on the right 
track in the development of their agriculture. 
Their exports are wine, dried fruit, flour, grain, 
fresh vegetables, seeds, pork, and salt, besides 
metals, bullion, and ores. Of these, as I under- 



SPANISH POLITICS. 1 77 

stand, the average valuation is about $75,000,000. 
I have placed these in the order of their value, 
giving those of most pecuniary importance first, 
You cannot but observe that they are things 
which bring a high price, when they are well 
made, — things in which sunshine, and a good 
deal of it, generally makes an important part of 
the value. This is certainly encouraging in the 
Spanish problem, — if, as I suppose, the real 
questions are industrial and agricultural, — how 
to make Spain yield more oil, more wine, more 
grain, and more fruit. 

I was well pleased in London in August to see 
Spanish melons fresh and good. One of the im- 
mense advantages which Northern Europe can 
derive from the railroad and steamboat system 
is the supply of fresh fruit from Southern Eu- 
rope. But I do not think that they yet utilize 
their facilities in this way nearly as freely as we 
do ours. Say what you please of the advantages 
of Florida, and I think few people have said 
more of them than I have, it does not surpass 
Spain in the production of fresh fruits, and it 
does not even approach her in the production 
of oil and wine. 

I say I do not think that the real difficulty is 
with the Spanish people. I have very little 
hope for pure Celtic races. But these people 
have a very large infusion of Gothic blood, and 



178 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

it is by no means certain that those whom the 
Goths found there were of Celtic origin. They 
are justly proud of many of their local institu- 
tions, which are certainly often admirable. You 
have to arrange that forty persons shall learn to 
read where ten can do so now. 

I ought to add, that far beneath this instruc- 
tion it may be necessary to teach them how to 
tell the truth. 

Literally, every foreigner whom I talked with 
told me that the Spaniards are all liars ; but of 
this I myself saw absolutely nothing. I found 
a very civil, friendly, self-respecting, and thought- 
ful people, ready to oblige, and not seeking the 
usual European pence or shilling. They seem 
to me a good deal like our simple Block Isl- 
anders, or unsophisticated people of the best 
type in New England. I do not like to think 
that I might be undeceived if I had stayed there 
longer ; but I know that I had little chance to 
learn. 

I really had flattered myself, as you may 
imagine Tityrus saying, that my residence of a 
few weeks in Madrid had put me a little on my 
guard as to foreign accounts of Spanish politics. 
But when, after six months absence, I had been 
steadily looking through the colored spectacles 
of London editors, and the very oblique trans- 
mission by submarine cable of the very crooked 



SPANISH POLITICS. 1 79 

rays which pass through those spectacles, I was 
quite as easily deceived as the wisest of us. 

We were all told, thrice a day perhaps this 
winter, that the Marshal Serrano had, in the re- 
cess of the Cortes, created a coalition of the ex- 
treme of one side of the spectrum with the 
extreme of the other, — a sort of violet-red or, 
red-violet party, which was wholly to overwhelm 
poor Sagasta, and any parties of yellow or green 
which there might be in the middle. Being told 
so all the time, I gradually gave way, yielded 
from my optimistic hope that all would come 
out right, and supposed poor Sagasta must take 
the back seat as soon as the Cortes met again. 

The Cortes met, a test vote was reached at 
once, and lo, Sagasta had an overwhelming 
majority ! So much for newspaper news from 
Spain. When I was in Madrid, I knew that 
ninety-nine out of a hundred words in the tele- 
grams from London were wrong. 

I will not undertake to go into any solution of 
the names of parties. You might as well under- 
take in America to tell what a party is doing by 
the etymology of its name, " democrat, barn- 
burner, republican, or loco-foco, ,, as analyze the 
etymology of one of the Spanish names. If they 
make a fusion, they unite the names of the 
fused parties ; as if our coalition in Massachu- 
setts which sent Charles Sumner to the Senate 



180 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

had been called the " Democratic Free-Soil 
party." And "Democratic Dynastic" would not 
seem queer to a trained Spanish politician. 

Castelar is still, I think, highly respected. 
I found his books everywhere on sale. The 
papers which he has published in American and 
English journals have been collected in volumes 
and published in the Spanish language. He is 
the responsible editor of a daily evening journal 
called " El Dia," which I found rather the most 
readable of any of the Spanish papers. I am 
sorry to say it has but a small circulation, — about 
eight thousand copies daily, I believe. While I 
was in Madrid, Garibaldi died, and Castelar pub- 
lished quite at length a notice of him, which 
included a long account of his own personal in- 
terviews with Garibaldi, one at the time when 
he was serving in France with the Italian legion. 

I was a believer in the Spanish Republic, as 
long as any man not quite a fool could believe 
in it, — a perfectly ignorant believer, but on gen- 
eral grounds. Now it is all over, I ought to 
say that they appear to have made " a very poof 
show." Whether the people did not like a re- 
public I can hardly say ; but I think they did 
not. I fancy the men at the fore knew next 
to nothing about administration, and made a 
sad business of the mere detail of government 
itself. Abraham Lincoln said, that in any one 



SPANISH POLITICS. l8l 

of his first regiments in the war there were men 
enough to have taken all the departments of ad- 
ministration and to carry them decently through. 
This was probably true. Just that thing, I sup- 
pose, was not true, when, by a happy chance, 
Castelar and his friends came into power in 
Spain. I think that they did not know how 
to Post-Office, to Interior, to War Department, 
to Navy, or to Finance, if I may invent some 
convenient verbs. Anyhow, it happened that 
they were all turned out, and I think nobody 
regretted it. 



CHAPTER XII. 

KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 

The excellent Ricci, who had the care of our 
physical welfare while we lived in Madrid, said 
one day, with a loyal sigh, as he praised the 
water with which Madrid is blessed, that they 
" owed that at least to Queen Isabella." The 
Bad Queen thus had the merit of the great 
aqueduct given to her, as in the Sierra I had 
found that she had the credit of the admirable 
road. So much virtue is there in a name. The 
name of Isabella is attached both to road and to 
aqueduct, and her memory will be as likely to 
be connected with them in the minds of the peo- 
ple as with any less deserving transaction of her 
reign. So much is there in any name, with all 
, deference to the Signorina Giuletta, and so true 
is it that people " throw on the King " all the 
good they can, as well as all the evil. 

In the fulness of time Isabella had to be 
turned out for clear, sheer bad behavior, so bad 
that I suppose nobody chooses to say that she 
might, could, or should have been kept in, 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION 1 83 

though perhaps she would have been could she 
have had her own way. Her title" at Spanish 
law was none of the best. Women had not suc- 
ceeded since Isabella the Good, and it was not 
until it was clear that she was to have no broth- 
er, that the edict was made just before she was 
born, in 1830, reversing all old laws of succes- 
sion, by which she became Queen when she was 
really an infant three years old. Don Carlos, 
her uncle, never assented to this decree which 
deprived him of the throne, and there followed 
the Carlist intrigues and rebellions of half a cen- 
tury. As Don Carlos mixed himself up as a 
Bourbon fanatic with the bigoted Romanism of 
the northern provinces, Isabella's party became, 
rather from necessity, the supposed representa- 
tive of Liberalism after one fashion or another, 
though of course within itself were all shades. 
So they fought and caballed while this child 
grew up to womanhood. And she, as soon as 
she was old enough to do wrong, managed to 
do it, in one wretched way or another, until in 
the reactions of the revolutionary wars of 1848 
and later years even Spain could not stand her 
and her debaucheries longer, and she was com- 
pelled to abdicate. 

So it is that at the Hippodrome at Paris I saw 
what pretended to be her state carriage, and so 
it is that she makes one of the coterie of exiled 



1 84 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

princes who are hanging round one or another 
European capital. For a while the Spanish 
government let her live in retirement in the 
beautiful palace called the Alcazar, in Seville. 
But she behaved so badly there, that they had 
to send her out of the country. 

Spain tried one and another experiment after 
she had done with the Bad Queen, and finally in 
1874 returned to the type, as Dr. Darwin would 
say, and offered her crown to Isabella's son, 
who had grown up in the advantages of exile. 
The boy had had the advantage in earlier life, 
as I am fond of telling my young friends, of 
being trained by a Boston governess. Remem- 
ber that, young gentlemen, who sit under Miss 
Simonds's mild empire at the Rice School. It 
is a training which the sons of queens might 
envy. As I have already said, the distinguished 
lady to whose care was intrusted the education 
of the children of Isabella was Madame Calde- 
ron. She was wife and afterwards widow of 
Senor Calderon, who for many years represented 
his government at Washington, and was then 
appointed its first Minister in Mexico on the 
pacification which followed the separation of a 
generation between old Spain and new Spain. I 
remember an anecdote which I believe I heard 
from his own lips, of the braggart General Santa 
Ana, President of Mexico. Senor Calderon, in 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 1 85 

a conference with Santa Ana, then President, 
referred to Revillagigedo, as one of the most 
successful of the old Mexican viceroys, a man 
who had understood Mexico, and whose rule 
had been a benefit to her. Santa Ana cor- 
dially indorsed Senor Calderon's opinion, and 
said : " I always imitate him when I can ; he 
used to drive out with eight horses, and I always 
do the same." 

Madame Calderon visited Mexico with her 
husband, and her account of that visit, " Life in 
Mexico/' is one of the most agreeable books of 
modern travel. 

But it is not so much as Madame Calderon 
that she is remembered among the older people 
of the best circles in Boston, but as Miss Fanny 
Inglis. When Mrs. Macleod opened a school 
in Boston, which many of the matrons of Boston 
remember, her sister, Miss Inglis, her principal 
assistant, with brilliancy and success well re- 
membered, gave her invaluable services in this 
school for six years. During that time she was 
a great favorite in Boston society ; and to many 
a bright anonymous paragraph, and sometimes 
to a bright anonymous pamphlet, her name 
was, rightly or wrongly, given. I learn from 
the American Cyclopaedia that she was the 
great-granddaughter of Colonel Gardiner, who, 
as readers of " Waverley " will recollect, fell 



1 86 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

at Prestonpans, and who enjoyed Whitefield's 
sermons. 

This is the lady to whose admirable intelli- 
gence the education of the children of Queen 
Isabella was fortunately intrusted. It is said 
that her relations with the ladies, the sisters of 
the King, have always remained tender and 
intimate. These ladies are the Infanta Isabelle, 
who is now the widow of the Prince Gaetan, the 
Infanta Marie della Paz, and the Infanta Eulalie. 
Two of the princesses reside at the palace, and 
we frequently met them driving. The Gotha 
Almanach reveals the fact that they are twenty 
and eighteen years old. The King, their brother, 
was born in 1857. 

Almost every afternoon the clatter of out- 
riders beneath the windows called to the bal- 
cony people so unphilosophical as take a per- 
sonal interest in royalty, that they might see 
the carriage-and-four dash by in which the In- 
fanta Maria de las Mercedes took her daily air- 
ing. She was always in the arms of her nurse, 
being at that time twenty-two months old. The 
little thing bears the name, not of her mother, 
but of the first wife of the King, a lady very 
much beloved in Spain by her husband and 
people, who died June 26, 1878. The present 
Queen is a daughter of the Archduke Charles 
of Austria. 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 1 87 

The King was a good deal occupied while I 
was in Madrid, and so was I, as I have said, and 
nothing transpired of that importance which 
made it necessary for him to send for me. Ex- 
cept as I passed him in his carriage, therefore, 
I had but one opportunity to see him. This 
was at the annual meeting of the Agricultural 
Society. The meeting was held in the Agricul- 
tural or Horticultural Gardens, which are on or 
near the Prado, not far from the great picture- 
gallery. The grounds are very beautiful, with 
abundance of rare trees, shrubs, and flowers. 
In a convenient place a pavilion had been erect- 
ed, under which were two or three chairs, one 
of which is, I suppose, to be called a throne. 
In front, at the right and left of a wide gravel- 
path, and under the shade of trees, were ar- 
ranged seats for the assembly, enough perhaps 
for three hundred people. The company was 
admitted by tickets, and I should think fully 
one-half were ladies. If I understand rightly, 
this was rather unusual, and it was thought to 
be rather an advance that ladies should have at- 
tended such a meeting as this. Punctually, the 
King, and perhaps half the Cabinet, came up the 
broad walk from the entrance to the garden. 
He is well-made, a handsome, manly looking 
fellow, modest and pleasing in his bearing. He 
removed his hat and bowed to the right and 



1 88 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

left, as he walked to the seat prepared for him. 
Then Senor Don Diego Martinez made the 
address, with which the meeting opened. He 
spoke very well for perhaps twenty minutes; it 
was much such an address as we should expect 
at a farmers' club or a cattle-show, on the im- 
portance of science to agriculture, on the pos- 
sible improvement of the agriculture of Spain, 
and on the superiority of agriculture to politics 
as a cure for the evils of the country. The es- 
pecial point which interested me most, in which 
he burst outside these commonplaces, was the 
urgency with which he proposed some sort of 
farmers' banks, which he thought necessary 
for the proper development of the agricultural 
interest. 

Everybody listened with attention to the ad- 
dress, and it was cordially applauded. When it 
was finished, the King stepped forward and 
shook hands cordially with Senor Don Diego, 
and seemed to compliment him. Several mem- 
bers of the society were presented to the King, 
and he and his suite then withdrew, followed by 
four-fifths of the assembly. The others, who I 
suppose were the regular members of the soci- 
ety, remained for other papers or a discussion. 
This, if he had known it, was the King's best 
chance to consult me as to the administration of 
Spain, for, as I have said, we met on no other 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 1 89 

occasion. But, as I must add, he was getting on 
very well, and he said nothing to me, and I 
said nothing to him. We slowly passed out of 
the beautiful garden with other spectators of the 
ceremony, and were just in time at the gate to 
see the King step lightly into his carriage, a 
sort of dog-cart, take the reins and drive rapidly 
off, with a gentleman at his side. A groom 
scrambled up behind, and the King drove off so 
rapidly that the dragoons, if they are dragoons, 
had to spur up and go in rapid pursuit. For us, 
the humblest of his subjects, we went along the 
Prado, to Calle Alcala, and there took a horse- 
car, at a cent apiece, to our homes. It is the 
cheapest country for horse-cars. I said to an 
Englishman that the fare was cheap, and he 
happily replied that it could not be cheaper, 
which is true, considering the coinage. 

I lost my way in the Horticultural Garden, 
and a nice little fellow from among the workmen 
took ten minutes to set me right and take me 
to the place of assembly. I was really grateful 
to him, and offered him a trifle of money, though 
with some hesitation ; but he refused very pleas- 
antly, and said he was very glad to oblige. This 
could not have happened in England. But the 
truth is, that neither this boy nor his ancestors 
had ever been vassals in a feudal system, and 
neither at law nor by custom was he my in- 
ferior in rank. 



190 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

ADMINISTRATION. 

It is usual to say that the Spanish administra- 
tion is bad, that the officers are corrupt, and 
that a great deal of money paid in taxes does 
not find its way into the Treasury. Of the truth 
of such charges I cannot speak. But I do not 
give full credence to them, because I know that 
in my own country there is a chronic fashion of 
speaking of our administration as being worthless 
and profligate, while I know that in fact, how- 
ever it might be improved, it is the best admin- 
istration that has ever been attained in the world, 
and the most economical. 

The public stocks sell at thirty-three or thirty- 
four per cent, which certainly shows bad finance. 
I think I have said that the roads are perfectly 
secure, which shows that somebody has broken 
down the brigandage. As for public works, 
Spanish engineering has always ranked high, 
and I think it still deserves that distinction. 
You see at every point the drawback of having 
a people who are puzzled by the simplest arith- 
metical problems, and of whom four-fifths can 
neither read nor write. But I found a good 
many matters of detail, in which it seemed to 
me that their desire to oblige and universal 
courtesy had taught them some things which 
we might learn. For instance, although they 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 191 

have very few travellers from abroad, I found a 
public interpreter at the railroad station, whose 
business it was to help travellers who did not 
understand Spanish. We have of German trav- 
ellers here a hundred times the number of for- 
eigners who pass through Madrid ; but I never 
saw or heard of an official interpreter at one of 
our stations. I have been insulted at the New 
York ticket-office of the New Haven Railroad 
because I offered English coin at the window. 

Many of the police arrangements of Madrid 
seem to me very clever. The system of water- 
ing the streets is a great deal better than ours. 
The protection of foot-passengers, where build- 
ing is going on, is more complete than anything 
we know. I am disposed to think that men's 
eagerness to take even the humblest lines of 
government work is tenfold greater than even 
Mayor Palmer ever dreamed of among the loaf- 
ers who storm City Hall. But, as I have said 
before, they certainly seem to get good men 
into the important places somehow. 

The water-carriers have always been an im- 
portant element in Madrid politics. Truly or 
not, they have the reputation of turning out more 
than one government. You would have sup- 
posed that the aqueduct would have put an end 
to them and their duty. On the other hand, it 
seems rather as if it had been built for their 



192 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

convenience; for there is no distribution by 
pipes through most of the houses. The aque- 
duct delivers the water at public fountains and 
hydrants, and at such places the water-carriers 
provide themselves, and carry the water, just as 
formerly, to the several houses and flats. 

A NATIONAL BISHOP. 

I had the pleasure of calling upon the Rever- 
end Senor Don Jose Cabrera, the Bishop of the 
National Church, as it calls itself, of Spain. I 
have already described one of -the services of 
this church at Seville. The Bishop is an agree- 
able and intelligent gentleman, and he gave me 
an interesting account of the movement of which 
he is the nominal head. Under the present Span- 
ish constitution all religions are tolerated, but the 
Roman Catholic religion is the only communion 
which may "publish" its ceremonies, or may 
conduct " public " services. Just how much or 
how little " public " and " publish " mean is, of 
course, a question. Under very radical govern- 
ments the Protestants, of whatever name, would 
not hesitate to announce their religious services 
in the newspapers; under governments sup- 
posed to be reactionary, they would not make 
such publications. The present fact is, that in 
all Spain there are between sixty and seventy 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 193 

Protestant congregations of all sorts and kinds, 
of which only eight congregations make up the 
so-called National Church, of which Sefior Don 
Jose Cabrera is the head. 

In making up their liturgy, they have drawn 
almost exclusively from that old national lit- 
urgy of Spain which I spoke of in describing 
the church in Seville. It is the same in sub- 
stance which is known to scholars as "the lit- 
urgy of St. James. " As I have said, in Spain it 
takes the name of the " Mozarabic liturgy." I 
can hardly expect general readers to be well 
acquainted with it ; but I have a feeling that in 
some of Miss Yonge's more High-Church sto- 
ries there is a reference to it. The Gothic Church 
used this liturgy always, so long as it existed. 
When the Moors conquered Southern Spain, 
they permitted the Christians still to hold their 
religious services in their several cities. They 
maintained them, of course, by the old forms, 
and it is thus that the queer name "Mozarabic" 
has come to be given to the liturgy of the 
Goths, or of " St. James." As has been already 
said, when the Moors were swept out, the forms 
of the encroaching Church of Rome had taken 
possession of France, and so of Northern Spain. 
So here were two liturgies in presence of each 
other. The legend says that the King decided 
the question by the result of a tournament, in 

13 



194 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

which one knight was the champion of either 
party; the Mozarabic knight unhorsed his op- 
ponent, and so the two services were permitted 
to exist side by side, in the cities where the 
Mozarabic churches still continued. 

But I am afraid that in presence of the In- 
quisition-defended Roman ritual the Mozara- 
bic form, like so many other national forms, 
would have gone to the wall but for the loyal 
interest of Ximenes, Bishop of Toledo in 1500, 
and the practical determination of an archbishop 
of Mexico, who had been educated in Toledo, 
the last city of the Mozarabic Rite. He left a 
fund for the maintenance of priests whose duty 
it still is to chant and to pray in the Mozarabic 
forms. One of these gentlemen sold to me my 
copy of the Ritual Book. 

I saw no sign whatever of any vital or eager 
interest in this or any Protestant organization. 
I saw signs, indeed, of scepticism, not to say 
sheer infidelity and atheism. I attended closely 
at Catholic services in Madrid and elsewhere, 
and never saw what we should call a large con- 
gregation ; but I did see many congregations of 
people heartily and profoundly interested. 

" The language lends itself to eloquence, " as 
a Spanish statesman said to me. At several 
different occasions I heard preachers of great 
spirit and earnestness. They never had even a 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. 1 95 

scrap of paper for a brief. They spoke with 
great fluency, and they kept well to the point 
in hand. They held the close attention of their 
hearers. 

It may have been by an accident, but the 
special church services which I saw which were 
most largely attended and seemed most to in- 
terest people were afternoon services in Madrid, 
held at the direction of ladies' societies, which 
I should think corresponded to the charity so- 
cieties in our Protestant churches. When the 
anniversary of such a society comes round, it 
holds, if I understand rightly, a meeting or a series 
of meetings, not simply for an " annual report/' 
indeed, not at all for that, but rather to quicken 
the spirit of devotion or sacrifice on which all 
charity must depend. The assemblies, not per- 
haps very large, seemed like gatherings of people 
with a common cause. Some series of preach- 
ers, perhaps of special eloquence, had been ap- 
pointed ; and on one occasion the particular 
young man whom I heard preached particularly 
well. Then, as you went out, you found a table 
in the church by the door, at which sat two 
ladies of the society, who perhaps gave you a 
report or received your contribution. 

The impression is that Spain has been over- 
ridden by mistaken charities. I am afraid this 
is true. Before the suppression of the monas- 



196 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

teries in 1836, about one-fifth of the whole nation 
was engaged in the service of the Church. 

Agriculturists, laborers, miners, artisans, shep- 
herds, and sailors constitute two-thirds of the 
population; one-seventh is composed of mer- 
chants and tradesmen, another seventh of offi- 
cials, the army, the nobility, the clergy, nuns, 
beggars, and pensioners. The nobility is very 
numerous ; the lower nobility mostly quite poor, 
counting near one million hidalgos. Beggars are 
almost as numerous, owing partly to the large 
number of benevolent institutions. In i860 
nearly five hundred thousand persons were main- 
tained in ten hundred and twenty-eight charita- 
ble institutions. 

As we reduce the payment of our national 
debt by $100,000,000 a year, or say one-six- 
teenth part of it, of course we ought to dismiss 
one-sixteenth part of the clerks in the Treasury 
every year. And possibly we do so. Perhaps 
this loyal reader knows. I do not. Of course 
there is a certain friction as these dismissed 
clerks rise to other and better work than treas- 
ury work. The stove, the carpet, the chairs in 
Washington must be sold. The family, on the- 
ory, moves West, and a cabin is built, a piano 
and another carpet are bought, and an open fire 
substituted for the stove. 

Now, let the reader look at the tables above, 



KING AND ADMINISTRATION. Ity 

and imagine the social change in Spain, when 
not one-sixteenth of the clerks in the Treasury, 
but two million of the whole population, were 
reformed out of the Church offices. If he will 
imagine two millions of sextons, and sextons' 
wives, and almoners, and sub-almoners, and 
clerks to sub-almoners, and copyists to sub- 
almoners, and book-keepers to copyists to sub- 
almoners, and errand-boys to book-keepers to 
copyists to sub-almoners, and finally mothers, 
grandmothers, and mothers-in-law dependent 
on the weekly wages of the errand-boys to the 
book-keepers to the copyists of the sub-almon- 
ers, he will be able to begin to conceive the 
practical difficulties which have flowed in on 
poor Spain as she attempts to absorb into 
square honest industry, — such industry as puts 
one grain of corn into the ground, and shows for 
it in autumn a hundred seeds as big and as good, 
— as she thus absorbs the industry which had 
been engaged in the external forms of charity or 
of religion. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

PERRO PACO AND THE BULLS. 

Next to the King and to Senor Sagasta, in 
public notoriety or talk, in the weeks that we 
were in Madrid, was Perro Paco. 

Perro means dog, and Paco is a proper name, 
which, for some reason not known to me, cor- 
responds with Francis or Frances. " Perro 
Paco " means, therefore, " Dog Paco." 

Of Perro Paco there were pictures in the win- 
dows of every music-shop of note. There were 
waltzes and galops written in his honor. The 
finest confectioner's shop had its windows abso- 
lutely filled with hundreds of representations of 
him in sugar. 

Two rival journals were issued wholly in his 
interest, of which all the contents were devoted 
to supposed anecdotes of Perro Paco, or other 
dog news. The first number of one of them 
had simulated telegrams from the dog of Mont- 
argis, the dogs of the Simplon, and other famous 
dogs. 

The local editor of any journal would have 
been thought very negligent, in the last week of 



PERRO PACO AND THE BULLS. 199 

my residence in Madrid, had he not inserted at 
least one note with regard to Perro Paco. 

Who, then, was Perro Paco? Alas ! the ques- 
tion has to be cast in the past tense. 

Perro Paco was a dog, apparently not of noble 
race. It was said that he was not of any pure 
blood which has a name, but that he was what 
is commonly called a cur. I am ashamed to 
say that, with these eyes, I never saw him; 
but I can speak in concurrence with the opinion 
expressed above, if I am qualified to do so by 
seeing several thousand representations of him. 

One day last spring Perro Paco appeared for 
the first time in the Puerta del Sol, which is, as 
I should have said, a sort of glorified Scollay 
Square. It is, perhaps, twenty times as large in 
surface as is that liberal breathing-place, and it 
has a large basin for a fountain in the middle. 
Its resemblance to Scollay Square consists in 
this, that it is the central ganglion of the circu- 
lation of street-cars and omnibuses, and that it 
is the highest point of the service of the street 
railway. The finest hotels are near it, gener- 
ally indeed fronting it. 

In the Puerta del Sol one day appeared Perro 
Paco. 

How he came there I do not know. The 
newspapers were rather fond of telling. I fancy 
any bright fellow on the press who wanted to 



200 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

do his share for his " funny column " invented a 
new Gil Bias story of the wanderings of Perro 
Paco before he arrived at the Puerta del SoL 
But these stories are all mythical. Perro Paco 
first emerges into the clear Brush-light of his- 
tory on the day when he first appears in the 
Puerta del Sol. 

Time came for lunch, or almuerzo, and Perro 
Paco was hungry. He trotted to the Cafe de 
Suiza, the Swiss coffee-house, which has the 
reputation of being the most fashionable of the 
immense coffee-houses which make up so large 
a part of Madrilenan life. At the Cafe de 
Suiza hundreds of persons were at their lunch, 
and here the fame of Paco begins. It is said 
that when some one of the guests threw him a 
bone, Paco refused to take it. Another threw 
him a bone, which also he refused. It was not 
till a young gentleman of noble family threw 
him a piece of mutton chop that Paco conde- 
scended to eat. From that moment his fame 
was established. Here was an aristocratic dog, 
who would take no food except at the Suiza, 
and even then would only take it from the 
hands of noblemen. 

This is the only one of a thousand anecdotes 
of Paco which any one pretended was true. 
For the rest, every journal had one or more of 
his invented good things. The theatres had 



PERRO PACO AND THE BULLS. 201 

plays, in which he was introduced as a charac- 
ter, and it was sometimes announced that he 
would be present in the audience. I found he 
was talked about in joke, as you might ask 
about a celebrated matador. " Have you seen 
Perro Paco?" But I am not sure that person- 
ally I ever saw with the eye of the flesh any one 
who, with the eye of the flesh, had looked upon 
him. 

The one occasion when the public was sure of 
him was Sunday afternoon, when all the Madrid 
beau monde goes to the bull-fight. Perro Paco 
always knew the day, and went with the rest. 
To the delight of the throng, he would be seen 
trotting down the Calle Alcala to the Prado, 
and so to the Arena, and here he was always 
admitted. I do not think other dogs were per- 
mitted there, but neither door-keeper nor mana- 
ger would have cared to resist the public feeling 
of a Madrid audience, determined that Perro 
Paco should see the show. On Monday morn- 
ing his presence would be announced in the 
journal as regularly as the King's, if not with the 
same dignity. And the audience would have 
felt that an important part of the show was omit- 
ted, had they not seen Perro Paco as well as the 
bulls. 

Alas ! poor Paco went once too often. On 
Sunday, June 18th, he trotted down as usual to 



202 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

the Arena, and, as usual, was admitted. He was 
always admitted within the sacred circles, where 
the actual battle goes on between bulls, horses, 
and men. On this occasion, at the very crisis 
of one of the encounters, Perro Paco dashed at 
the bull in a way which annoyed, and probably 
endangered, the matador himself. The man 
struck back with his sword-hilt to give Paco a 
notion that he was in the way, and struck in 
such fashion that the handle entered his open 
mouth and wounded him severely. He was 
withdrawn by attendants, evidently in pain. 
I detail these accidents from the daily bulletins 
in the papers. He was at once sent to a hos- 
pital; the best medical attendance did not 
avail, and after some days his death was an- 
nounced. 

I left Madrid while he was languishing, and I 
do not know who replaced him in the affections 
and interest of the local reporters. 

BULL-FIGHTS. 

This little incident is really the most impor- 
tant contribution I can make to the contempo- 
rary history of bull-fights. Even a traveller 
has to " draw the line somewhere," and I drew 
it at the bull-fights. The ladies of my party 
shared my prejudices, and I found the same 



PERRO PA CO AND THE BULLS. 203 

feeling and habit in the Minister of the United 
States, our delightful friend, Mr. Hamlin, and 
his charming and popular lady. I am afraid 
that the estimable Ricci went on Sunday after- 
noons, but he was always home and at dinner, 
and he was afraid to tell me that he had gone. 
So I can tell nothing of what these eyes saw, 
though I could recount the criticisms of the 
Clapps and Clements of the Madrid press. 
But this court would reject such testimony as 
hearsay. 

I went one Saturday to Toledo, and as an 
omnibus took us from the station into the town 
I saw at once that we were attended by a throng 
of admirers. Far too modest to think they were 
admiring me, it was easy to see that there was 
a modest-looking man opposite me, in a short 
blue or purple jacket, adorned with many frogs, 
with a small cap on his head, which did not 
conceal a handsome braid of black hair, done 
up in a large knot behind, as any lady, who had 
as much handsome black hair, might be glad to 
arrange it. This was a famous matador, who 
was to be the star of the next day's entertain- 
ment at Toledo. It was upon him that the 
crowd was attending. The matadors of dis- 
tinction make the circuit of Spain, much as Mr. 
Denman Thompson and his company make the 
circuit of America; for a matador carries with 



204 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES, 

him his whole staff. Naturally a man does not 
like to trust his own life to the chance of skill 
or blundering on the part of local talent sup- 
plying picadores or banderilleros. 

As many of these travelling troupes have 
their headquarters in Madrid, the Madrid public 
is interested in their success ; and on Monday 
morning an important feature in " El Liberal/' or 
any other morning paper which supplies news of 
this sort, will be the short telegram from Cadiz 
or Seville or some other city, which announces 
briefly, " 6 bulls, 3 horses killed, no men." 

I never heard of a man being killed in the 
ring while I was in Spain, and I was in the 
habit of speaking of the sport as cowardly and 
unfair on this account. But since I left Spain 
I have seen many gentlemen who had seen 
matadors killed or wounded. 

There is a good story told of the Society for 
Preventing Cruelty to Animals. They needed 
money for their humane purposes, and accord- 
ingly accepted a benefit from the managers of 
the bull-fights. 

If you say anything about cruelty in conver- 
sation, you are generally met with the remark, 
that the horses are mere skin and bone, not 
worth five dollars, and would have to be killed 
the next day, anyway. I heard this said so 
often that I am sure it must be in print in some 



PERRO PA CO AND THE BULLS. 20$ 

familiar hand-book, but I have never found the 
public authority. 

It was said that the Prince of Wales did 
not go to a bull-fight, because public opinion in 
England would not let him. Once, and only 
once, did I hear the amusement reprobated in 
Spanish circles. The King and Court attend 
regularly. I think their absence would be un- 
favorably remarked upon. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

TOLEDO. 

The queer old city of Toledo is so near to 
Madrid, perhaps fifty miles away, that you are 
tempted to regard it as a sort of suburb, and 
visit it on an excursion. Nothing would make 
the handful of people who are left there, of 
whom there are, I find, fourteen thousand, more 
angry than any such suggestion. The Arch- 
bishop of Toledo is the Archbishop of Spain. 
It is, indeed, one of four or five capitals which 
Philip ruined, when he transferred the Court to 
Madrid. So I fancy Toledo does not much love 
Madrid, and would not like to be called a sub- 
urb. 

I must once more beg. the loyal reader to 
, hunt up his " Harper's " of last summer and read 
Mr. Lothrop's charming account of Toledo, and 
look at the capital illustrations which accompany 
it. Really, if I drew the illustrations myself, and 
Mr. Wilson ran them off from a double-cylinder 
lightning press at the rate of four million an 
hour, they would not be better. And, really, if 



TOLEDO. 207 

all the artistic and aesthetic people in the world 
composed or invented a dear old city of the age 
of Noah, or of Meshech, of Madai, or of Tiras (if 
by good fortune this loyal reader, well trained 
in early history, know who they may be), if, I 
say, the aesthetic or artistic Aladdin of most 
skill tried to make for you a queer old museum 
of a city, with all the quaint and strange things 
of old times, and if, when he had done, he set it 
up opposite to Toledo, Toledo would laugh it to 
scorn from the window of every shop. Every 
corner, tile, and brick-bat of Toledo is dead with 
antiquity. You apologize to people for speak- 
ing to them in Low Latin, the dear old tangle of 
a place is so old-fashioned. 

It stands on the banks of the Tagus. Near 
the junction of the Tagus and Alberche is Tala- 
vera de la Reina, a burgh or small town. The 
streets are poorly built and crooked. This 
place may have been the ancient Libora. A 
celebrated battle was fought under its walls be- 
tween the French and Anglo-Portuguese armies 
in 1809. This action is what is known in his- 
tory as the Battle of Talavera, and to this hour 
old English soldiers may be found who have 
inherited badges with the word " Talavera" on 
them. Loyal readers will observe that we are 
now on the Tagus, the river which flows west 
to Lisbon. 



208 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The English general formed the plan of march- 
ing into Andalusia and uniting the British forces 
with those of Cuesta; Napoleon's departure to 
the Austrian campaign giving him a favorable 
opportunity. By this movement he hoped to 
check the progress of the invaders to the south, 
and endanger their occupation of Madrid. But, 
unfortunately, Cuesta was jealous. and obstinate, 
and gave no help or assent to this plan ; when a 
favorable chance arrived for attacking Victor, 
Cuesta said he would not give battle on Sunday. 
This opportunity having thus been lost, the allies 
were obliged to receive battle instead of giving 
it. But even under these unfavorable circum- 
stances the French were defeated. The British 
forces had to defend themselves against double 
their own number, and Wellesley finally retreated 
to Portugal as the only way to save his army* 
For want of transport, which the Spanish gen- 
eral should have furnished, many of the wounded 
were left in the hands of the French. They were 
treated courteously, but this gave the French an 
opportunity to claim the victory in their de- 
spatches, which they had really resigned on the 
spot, by flying from the field. 

Sylva, a Spanish historian, supposes that To- 
ledo was founded five hundred years before the 
Christian era by a Jewish colony who called the 
town Toledoth, or the mother of nations. 



TOLEDO. 209 

The most interesting of buildings are the ca- 
thedral, an ancient mosque, and the Alcazar. 
The royal residence of Aranjuez, nearly seven 
leagues above Toledo, is surrounded with exten- 
sive and beautiful gardens. Near the palace is 
a small tower, built with great precision after a 
plan by one of the court architects. There is a 
lovely tradition of a secret way from the Alca- 
zar to one of the outlying palaces, miles away, 
which, I need not say, is now lost at both ends. 

The old city is like a robber-fastness on the 
cliffs above the fast-rolling river. Note that the 
Tagus supplies the water-power for the manu- 
facture, still famous, of Toledo blades, which can 
be made as well now as they ever were, if only 
Toledo blades were as necessary to life, liberty, 
and the pursuit of happiness as they once were. 
The railroad does not attempt the cliff, and you 
ride up in an omnibus; in our case, as I said, 
we were accompanied by a modest but famous 
matador. 

He and his sword-boxes and other parapher- 
nalia were dropped at some hotel. But the 
guide-books condemn all the hotels, of which, in 
a town of fourteen thousand people, there cannot 
be many. On the other hand, all travellers praise 
the Casa de Huespedes, which means " board- 
ing-house/' kept by two charming old ladies, 
whom I will not name. For aught I know, they 



210 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

may have flirted with Galba or Martial or Perti- 
nax. But all the same, they are tolerant to the 
people of this time. Some ancestors of this 
generation have condescended to put glass win- 
dows into the casements. But, as they stand 
open all the time, that does not much matter; 
for the rest, locks, latches, floors, doors, shut- 
ters, plan of the house, patio, and all the other 
arrangements are exactly like the rooms and 
fixtures described in Horace, or, as I say, in 
Terence or Martial. I am more and more a 
believer in the theory, that schools should be 
taken to these places for the scholars to see 
with their own eyes. No boy would ever mis- 
construe those most difficult words cubiculum, 
atrium, and the rest, who had slept in a cubi- 
culum and looked out upon an atrium. The 
word " hall, ,, with which I was taught to remem- 
ber atrium, is all wrong ; patio is the real ren- 
dering. 

My entertaining old friend Malte-Brun, the 
geographer, says, in his condescending French 
way, that when you have entered Toledo the 
only considerable buildings are the cathedral, 
the old mosque, and the Alcazar. This is as 
little as if you said that, after the traveller had 
crossed the Nile at Cairo, the only considerable 
buildings were the Sphinx and the Pyramids. 
There are people enough who will tell you that 



TOLEDO. 211 

the cathedral at Toledo is a building better 
worth your study and remembrance than St. 
Peter's at Rome. Such comparisons are, from 
the nature of the case, absurd ; but it is as absurd 
for the French geographer to sit so hard on 
poor Toledo, because it has within its walls 
only three, as he counts them, of the finest 
buildings in the world. In truth, many are to 
be added to his visit ; but this reader, safely re- 
ferred to Mr. Lathrop and to Amicis, will be 
spared my description. 

The cathedral has some points of interest 
which none of the other cathedrals of the world 
have. I need not say that the guide-books, in 
the usual vein of criticism, condemn this, having 
a feeling that there exists, in earth or heaven, 
some one type of an absolute cathedral, and 
that any divergence from it is sin. For my part, 
I had rather they should not be alike. It was 
reason enough for Philip II. to keep the capital 
at Toledo, that he had perhaps the richest ca- 
thedral in the world there. To this hour there 
has been none at Madrid. 

By the way, they show you altars of which 
they say, "The gold here was the first gold 
brought home by Columbus. " Generally speak- 
ing, the French in 1808 carried off the gold 
they found anywhere. The reader may remem- 
ber that I saw the absolute first gold in Charles 



212 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

V.'s missal. But there is no reason, by that, to 
dispute the statement made here. Columbus 
brought more gold than is in that book. 

By one of the principal doors, as in many 
other cathedrals, is a gigantic St. Christopher 
painted in fresco. The guides tell Americans 
in the Spanish cathedrals that these figures, far 
larger than any other pictures in the churches, 
are painted in honor of Columbus. But I doubt, 
for I found the same custom in Southern 
France — I think in Toulouse, where there was 
no tradition of Columbus. 



A CORO. 

As I have already said, a peculiarity of every 
large Spanish church is the separation, almost 
complete, of the coro from the rest of the church. 
You see something of the same thing in West- 
minster Abbey, where, it will be remembered, a 
small part of the building is screened off from 
the nave and aisles. In Spain, what would 
have been screens anywhere else, become solid 
walls rising perhaps half-way to the ceiling of 
the cathedral. Practically, it is a church in the 
cathedral. Observe that this is not in the place 
which we call the choir in an English cathedral ; 
that is to say, it is not at the extreme eastern end 
of the building. You will find at the end of the 



TOLEDO. 213 

building an altar, and very possibly a chapel. 
But the coro is in the very middle of the build- 
ing. At the eastern end of it, it has its own 
altar, and behind this altar, in all the cathedrals 
which I saw, a very high wall, which is, I suppose, 
architecturally called a screen. This screen is 
very richly decorated with gold, and especially 
with carving. Here, more than anywhere else, 
perhaps, do you see the interesting and often 
very beautiful painted statuary which makes the 
distinctive part of Spanish art. 

At the other end of the coro, also screened in 
by high walls, are the seats for the deans, can- 
ons, and other clergy or ecclesiastics. They are 
ranges of seats, such as one sees in an English 
cathedral, and often all the resources of art are 
lavished on their adornment. I hope I may be 
forgiven, but my mind always goes back to the 
type, and I always like to imagine these elegant 
carvings as in very fact executed by the knives 
of the worthy men whose duty it has been to sit 
in these seats. Of course they were really exe- 
cuted by them on the principle of " Quifacitper 
alium, facit per se" ("Who works by another, 
works by himself "). 

But I like to imagine the worthy priest, fond of 
fine art, who determines that his chair shall bear 
the emblem of a pelican for sacrifice, or a cluster 
of wheat for bounty, or a dove for purity, and 



214 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

then with his own hand executes the same. One 
even thinks of Fra Angelico and the canon 
Alonso at Granada. Nay, my mind goes back 
to an old Puritan church, which shall be name- 
less, where, in the side of a certain pillar, well 
known to me, there lingered from a former gen- 
eration the letters N. and O., as they had been 
cut by some worshipper of the eighteenth cen- 
tury. In such use of his hands he may have 
been able to keep his eyes open, and his ears, 
to attend the better to the pleading of the elder 
Cooper, on some drowsy afternoon. 

Whether, in fact, in any period of church his- 
tory, customs have permitted deans and can- 
ons, with their own knives, to carve upon the 
posts of their chairs, I do not know ; but if they 
have not done it by their own hands, they have 
done it by others at Toledo. And the result is 
one of the most beautiful exhibitions of wood- 
carving in the world, worthy not simply of the 
hurried research of half an hour, but of the care- 
ful study of weeks by the artist with drawing- 
book in hand. 

We were at Toledo on Sunday, and I took 
care to be present at the Mozarabic chapel, in the 
cathedral, that I might see and hear the curious 
Mozarabic liturgy which I have described, the 
last survival of the service of the original or 
national church of Spain, for the maintenance 



TOLEDO. 215 

of which the great Cardinal Ximenes left a 
fund. But for his zeal I am afraid it would 
have died out. It is different from the Roman 
service at almost every point ; the most striking 
peculiarity which can be described, perhaps, 
being, if I understand rightly, that there is a 
separate collect and other selections for every 
separate day of the year. At the period when 
we attended the Mozarabic service we were the 
only persons present, excepting the priests and 
acolytes. There were several churches in Toledo 
which maintained this rite in Ximenes's day; 
but this chapel is now the only one. 

The patron saint of the cathedral is Saint Ilde- 
fonso, and this is the spot where he received 
the chasuble from the Virgin. That legend is 
well known from the print, not unfamiliar, of 
Murillo's beautiful picture of the subject. The 
Virgin and two angels are about to invest the 
archbishop, who kneels reverently, with the 
chasuble. Behind him is a nun, an old woman 
with a lighted taper; Murillo is fond of good 
old women, as what true man is not? There is 
apt to be one, if possible, in his larger compo- 
sitions. The Virgin sits in Ildefonso's ivory 
chair, the bishop kneeling in front. Since that 
time, the legend says, no one has ventured to sit 
in that chair but the Archbishop Sisibert. Him 
indignant angels hurled from it, and he died mis- 



2l6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

erably. The Moors carried away the body of 
Ildefonso and the chasuble. But it is said that 
the chasuble is now in Oviedo, although invisible 
to mortal eyes. 

Ildefonso lived in the seventh century, holding 
this see from the year 657 to 667. He wrote a 
treatise on the perpetual virginity of the Holy 
Mother, and it was this which won him her 
favor. 

There is in Toledo a world of antiquarian 
wealth illustrating the Moorish period, and 
there are some curious relics of the Jews. 

As we left our hospitable friends of the Casa 
de Huespedes, I asked the major-domo how old 
the house was. 

"Ah! quien sabe, senior?" ("Who knows, 
sir?") 

I said, No, no one knew, but they could make 
a guess within a century or so. 

Oh, yes ! they could guess within a century. 
Yonder was the coat-of-arms of the old owner, 
or his symbolic crest. He was a Goth, and the 
Goths were driven out in the seventh century. 
The house was built a hundred or two years 
before that time. 

The house was in all probability thirteen or 
fourteen hundred years old. I should have 
guessed as much from the patches and darns in 
the velarium, or awning, which our dear old hos- 



TOLEDO. 217 

tesses, with loving care, were repairing, that it 
might for its fourteen hundredth summer keep 
off the nearly vertical sun from their plants, 
almost tropical, which they had in large pots in 
the patio or atrium below. 

Blessings on them for their lovely hospitality ! 
We bade them good-by; we hoped we should 
come again to stay longer; and we returned to 
Madrid. 



CHAPTER XV. 

MUSEUMS IN MADRID. 

THE armoury of Madrid has the reputation of 
being in some regards the finest in Europe, and 
I should think it deserved it. It was closed for 
extensive cleaning, polishing, and rearrangement. 
But the uniform Spanish courtesy admitted us, 
when I sent in to the administration a note say- 
ing that I was a stranger, who must soon leave 
town ; and, to tell the truth, we had some advan- 
tages in seeing things as they were taken to 
pieces, and in the explanations which a set of 
intelligent workmen and connoisseurs kindly 
gave, who would not have been there but for 
the repairs. 

The arms are all kept in exquisite order, as 
a man might keep a few pet weapons of his own. 
The collection is historical, and runs back as far 
at least as my house at Toledo. After reading 
Irving's Granada, and basking in those hot ac- 
counts of fight between Saracen and Christian 
knight, it was very interesting to see the actual 
coats-of-arms of Boabdil and of his victors. 



MUSEUMS IN MADRID. 219 

The CicTs sword is here, and every style of 
Moorish weapon and Moorish defensive armor, 
from the days of the first invasion down to the 
battle of Lepanto, of which there are many 
relics. 

Among more modern weapons are curious 
specimens of the early breech-loaders. I re- 
membered with interest some recent discussion 
as to the origin of the flint-lock, which has been, 
erroneously, ascribed to New England inge- 
nuity. Here is an exquisite flint-lock firearm, 
inlaid with great beauty, which was a present 
to Philip IV., somewhere in the middle of the 
seventeenth century, or perhaps a little earlier. 
It is, I think, a little curious that the ordinary 
books of reference do not condescend to tell at 
what time flint-locks were invented or came into 
general use. 

This museum is in a sort of wing of the great 
Royal Palace, which deserves, I suppose, its rep- 
utation of being the finest palace in Europe. 
' When Napoleon left his brother there, he is said 
to have told him that he would be better lodged 
than he was himself. 

There must have been some sort of royal edi- 
fice in Madrid from a very early period. King 
Ramiro in the year 939 took from the Arabs the 
town of Magerit, which was on the site of Ma- 
drid. At that early period the original Alcazar 



220 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

stood on the site of the present palace. A suc- 
cession of buildings followed each other, on the 
same spot, of which the last was burned in 1734. 
The present palace was then begun, and after 
half a century or more it took its present form. 
The successive architects were Jubarra and Sa- 
chetti. 

The proper front faces the city, and with two 
wings running forward encloses a fine square on 
three sides. The basement is largely occupied 
by the library, which I have already described. 
It also gives rooms for the offices of the royal 
domain. 

The State apartments are upstairs. I will 
not attempt the difficult task of describing vast 
and magnificent saloons ; but there is one small 
cabinet which I commend to the attention of 
lovers of ceramics. 

The whole wall of this beautiful chamber is 
porcelain. The groundwork of the whole is of 
dead gold color. From this rises a porcelain 
decoration or framework, shall I say, which is 
also of porcelain, of white, of green, and of dead 
gold. Framed by these decorations are differ- 
ent subjects, all treated in white porcelain of a 
creamy color, of what connoisseurs will know as 
pate tendre. This exquisite piece of work was 
made at the royal manufactory at the Buen 
Retiro. It is ascribed to Joseph Grice, who was 



MUSEUMS IN MADRID. 221 

at the head of this factory one hundred and 
twenty years ago. 

I may say, in passing, that, judging from what 
I saw in public and private collections, and from 
what you stumble upon in out-of-the-way shops 
and villages, Spain would be a very tempting 
field for a fanciful collector of pottery. The 
glazed tiles of Seville are so large, so handsome, 
and so cheap, that I should think that any archi- 
tect who had occasion to use many tiles would 
do well to make inquiries in Seville before he 
provided himself in England or in America. 

THE MUSEUM OF ART. 

I had often heard the gallery of Madrid also 
spoken of as perhaps the finest in Europe ; but 
I had not before understood that it is not only 
this, but one of the largest. The collection, as 
it now stands, was brought together by Isabella 
and her father within the present century. Fer- 
dinand took possession of a building designed by 
the architect Villanueva, in 1735, for a natural 
history museum, and did what he could to fit it 
for a gallery, and collected here the finest paint- 
ings in the different royal residences, as well, I 
believe, as those which had been recovered from 
France after Napoleon had captured them in his 
Spanish campaign. The gallery, as we now see 



222 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

it, was opened in 1819. It has been steadily im- 
proving ever since under the intelligent manage- 
ment of the two Madrazos, father and son, and 
of Don Pedro de Madrazo, to whom we owe the 
admirable catalogue, and to whose personal 
courtesies we were indebted every day. 

I will follow the example of a more distin- 
guished traveller in leaving it to learned fingers 
and wise hands to describe the indescribable. 

Without entering into detail, it is enough to 
say that the Spanish monarchs had the right of 
sovereigns with regard to all the best of the fine 
arts of the Low Countries, from the time when 
oil painting was invented there; and so you 
have here the most admirable examples of the 
very earliest Dutch and Flemish painters, and 
of Vandyke and Rubens. Then in their own 
country they had Alonso Cano, Velasquez, and 
Murillo. They did not despise them, but knew 
their worth to the very full. At the time of 
Leonardo, Raphael, and the rest in Italy, when 
Italian art was at its very best, Spain was at her 
very grandest, and her sovereigns, fond of art, 
were able to buy anything they chose. Thus, in 
a collection where the masterpieces have been 
brought together from all the palaces in Spain 
and from many of her churches, this gallery can 
boast of more examples of the very first order, 
if you count two great European schools, than 
is possible anywhere else. 



MUSEUMS IN MADRID. 223 

As for Velasquez, whom Philip IV. called 
" his only painter," he cannot be thoroughly 
studied anywhere else. This very summer, one 
picture of his was sold at auction in London to 
the National Gallery for ,£10,000. I do not 
know how many. there are in Madrid, but of 
large pictures of his there are certainly more 
than fifty kings, queens, infants, dwarfs, court 
fools, ruffians, every-day people of every rank, 
every costume, and every occupation, the most 
vulgar or the most princely, Velasquez transfers 
them all to his canvas, and gives to each that in- 
tensity, that tremor of life itself, which in each of 
his works makes a masterpiece absolutely unique 
in the domain of painting. I follow the lan- 
guage of Roswag's spirited guide-book. The 
same writer says, and so far as I have any right 
I like to indorse the remark, " You may com- 
pare all these surprising creations of his pencil 
with the most perfect work in portraiture of the 
greatest artists and those most esteemed in the 
Italian, Flemish, and Dutch schools, and the 
contrast will simply show the astonishing superi- 
ority of Velasquez. In the midst of all these 
men of illustrious genius, if you take the point of 
view of reality, of life, and of truth, he is the 
only one who knows how to express himself 
without convention, without apparent fiction, 
and, to say everything in one word, without 
artifice." 



224 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

As late as 1830 no separate head was given to 
Velasquez's name in the " Encyclopaedia Ameri* 
cana." In most works of artistic criticism in 
that time and earlier he will be found neglected 
in like wise. I think such neglect is due wholly 
to his popularity in Spain and to the seclusion 
of this peninsula. They would not let his pic- 
tures go away. There are, therefore, very few 
in foreign collections, and through the seven- 
teenth and eighteenth centuries there were so 
few travellers in Spain from the rest of Europe 
who dared to express an opinion on painting, 
that the reputation which he had at home did 
not extend farther than Spain. It is a good 
instance of the " prophet honored in his own 
country," before he is heard of elsewhere. 

But why does not the same rule hold for 
Murillo? Murillo was certainly known outside 
of Spain. You can find admirable pictures of 
his in Italy, in Bavaria, in France, in England, 
one at least in Boston. This is a hard question. 
Oddly enough, like most hard questions, it re- 
ceives two answers quite opposite to each other. 
One set of critics say that he painted the Virgin 
in a way so admirably in accordance with 
church traditions, that he had the whole machin- 
ery of the Roman Church on his side to carry 
his renown anywhere. Another authority says, 
" He seems to have possessed the power of adapt- 



MUSEUMS IN MADRID. 225 

ing the higher subjects of art to the common 
understanding, and succeeded in at once capti- 
vating the learned and unlearned. Hence the 
universal popularity of his works throughout 
Europe, notwithstanding Ruskin places him 
among the base artists." I suppose that just 
what Ruskin meant was that Murillo worked for 
a reputation, and that only those people are on 
the highest grade who " make themselves of no 
reputation." It is to be observed, in this con- 
nection, that when Murillo wanted money for 
travel he " executed a number of pictures for 
the colonial market, which were distributed by 
traders through the Spanish American posses- 
sions." Moral : If you want a wide reputation 
in the world, scatter your work through America. 
Pardon this digression, loyal reader. What 
you and I have to observe of him, in the muse- 
um of the Prado, is that here are twenty-nine of 
Murillo's noblest pictures. Here among others 
are the Virgin presenting the chasuble to Ilde- 
fonso, the Adoration of the Shepherds, the Divine 
Shepherd, St. John Baptist as a child, Jesus and 
John as children, and the Education of the Vir- 
gin, which you and I have had hung before our 
eyes in the hard but accurate Spanish prints 
since 1829; nay, on copies of which we have 
exercised our infant pencils, and, later yet, our 
manly cameras. As in the case of Velasquez, 

15 



226 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

most of the Murillos hang together in a hall 
given to the Spanish school, and there is a sort 
of satisfaction in seeing them illustrated and ex- 
plained by each other, just as there is in seeing 
Velasquez thus illustrated and explained. 

I say nothing of Goya, of whom the books 
say much, because I do not believe in him at all. 

Everybody who owns even five framed photo- 
graphs knows that there is a certain pleasure in 
taking them down from time to time, and hang- 
ing them in new places. It is analogous to the 
profound satisfaction of putting your bed where 
the wardrobe was, the wardrobe where the bu- 
reau was, and the bureau where the bed was. It 
makes a great row, and it saves ever so much 
room. 

I need not say that such change of pictures 
goes on from time to time in the Royal Gallery, 
because such is the law of galleries and public 
libraries. You never visit one but they " are 
making a change in the arrangement, which will 
be a great improvement when it is done." 

So is it that sometimes the Isabella salon con- 
tains one set of pictures and sometimes another. 
But it always means to contain the best. It is a 
sort of tribune, only much larger. It is com- 
fortable, well lighted ; and here you bask in the 
light and blessedness of a hundred, more or less, 
of the most exquisite pictures in the world. 



MUSEUMS IN MADRID. 227 

And, to bring up with a very short turn what 
there is to say of this marvellous gallery, — not 
to be tempted forward or backward into raving 
about the pictures, and so breaking a firm reso- 
lution not to rave, — to speak of those carnal 
matters which in fact affect Thomas, Richard, 
Henry, and their congeners in this world, all the 
people who carry on the externals of the gallery 
are nice to you. They like to have you come, 
and they are sorry to have you go away. From 
the man at the door who takes your umbrella, 
all the way up to Senor Don Jose Madrazo, the 
accomplished artist who oversees the collection, 
every one is good to you. It is not as in the 
Louvre, or in galleries I have seen nearer home, 
where they wish there were no visitors to the 
gallery, or as sacristans of churches sometimes 
wish no one would come to church. On the 
other hand, everybody is pleased that more vis- 
itors have come. And the worse the Spanish of 
those visitors the more they seem to be pleased. 

They are not overrun with visitors. They do 
not think that you are a wretched tourist " doing 
the gallery." They receive you as Mr. Barton 
would receive a stranger who comes to Worces- 
ter to the Antiquarian Society, and wants to 
draw the Michael Angelo's Moses, or to consult 
an old volume of the " News-Letter." They 
seem to know that you are decent people, and 
are really interested in their treasures. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

OUT-DOORS LIFE. 

As has been already said, perhaps, no one 
goes into the streets between twelve and three 
unless he be a Francese or a perro, — a for- 
eigner or a dog. Those sacred hours are re- 
served for the siesta. Siesta means the sixth 
hour, and if you count from average sunrise, 
the sixth hour will be at noon. At noon every 
sensible man and woman will retire for his daily 
doze. 

This reader may not be old enough to remem- 
ber the battle of San Jacinto in Texas, in which 
the independence of Texas from Mexico was 
assured. It depended on the siesta. 

At twelve o'clock, noon, the Mexican army 
retired for this necessary repose. At one P. M., 
or thereabout, when they were in the best of it, 
General Houston with his rabble rout of Texans 
and of Kentuckians, half horse and half alligator, 
attacked them, and in a very few moments the 
battle was over, to the disadvantage of the sleep- 
ing party. 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 229 

After three o'clock, the streets of Madrid look 
a little more lively; after four, a good many 
people are in motion; after five, carriages be- 
gin to drive to the Prado. 

Prado originally meant Pratus, which means 
a meadow. The little stream on which Madrid 
stands meandered through it, I suppose, though 
I cannot say I remember that I have seen it 
there. Prado now means a broad street, not un- 
like Commonwealth Avenue, running straight 
for several miles. It has lately been lengthened, 
and the resemblance to Commonwealth Avenue 
holds, in the new buildings, some of them pal- 
aces, which you may see going up at the sides 
in the newer points. For the rest, there are 
gardens or fine houses or palaces on each side. 
Some of the government offices are there. The 
great museum of pictures is generally called the 
Museo del Prado. The garden of the Horticul- 
tural Society is there. 

The Prado differs from Commonwealth Ave- 
nue in this: inside the roadways are lines of 
little chairs, wire-seated and painted yellow, 
lines which are miles long, for the people like 
you and me to sit in, who have no carriages, 
unless a friend invites us to drive. 

These chairs are superintended and adminis- 
tered by the men and women who have charge 
of the drinking-booths, if I may so call them. 



230 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

They are movable counters, from which is dis- 
pensed the sugared water and lemonade and 
orchata necessary for so large a throng as 
assembles in the Prado. 

I have sometimes seen behind the counter or 
bar of the smallest country tavern a cupboard in 
which all the bottles, decanters, glasses, and 
other paraphernalia of potations could be locked 
up at night together. Imagine such a cupboard, 
just big enough for two men to handle, perhaps 
six feet high and five feet wide. Imagine it 
standing on a table or counter, and so arranged 
that its doors shall enlarge this table when they 
fall, and it is opened. Hundreds of such stands, 
thousands perhaps, occupy the long spaces 
between the lines of chairs, which, as I have 
said, are reserved for the loafers and pedestrians 
on the Prado. Through the day, most of the 
cupboards are locked. As evening approaches 
they are all open, and one or two brisk attend- 
ants at each are ready to dispense the needed 
refreshments. 

Several very fine fountains are among the 
ornaments of the Prado, and the water-carriers 
pass up and down from fountain to booth, so 
that the supply shall never fail. 

Looking back on all this, after six or eight 
months, it seems to me queer that I cannot say 
whether wine or spirit is never sold here ; for the 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 23 1 

question of perpendicular drinking is the cen- 
tral question of the civilization of modern cities, 
and interests me deeply. It seems impossible, 
writing in Boston, that neither wine nor spirit 
should be sold in so many of these stalls. But 
I think it is not. I certainly never saw any one 
ask for any or take any. 

The drink of nineteen out of twenty of those 
who refresh themselves is sugared water. For 
this the sugar has been blown up into an aerated 
puff, like the sugar in the crust of a meringue. 
It is given you with the tumbler of water and 
with a spoon. It is so light that it dissolves 
almost instantly, and you use as much or as lit- 
tle as your taste demands. 

If you are more exacting, you ask for lemon- 
ade, or you may have orange juice for your 
water. 

If you are very hot, and need food as well as 
liquid, you order an orchata. An orchata is a 
very mild ice-cream, — I should say without 
much cream. The basis is some sort of creamy 
seed rubbed together into a paste, and mingled 
with the water, milk, or cream, which are frozen 
into a mass precisely resembling ice-cream. 

This you eat by suction, as I am told the 
thoughtless sons of Belial absorb sherry cob- 
blers ; only they, if I am rightly informed, use 
straws, or, in abodes of luxury, glass tubes. In 



232 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

Madrid you are served with the orchata in a tall 
glass, and with a dozen little rolls of very thin 
paste, precisely like what we eat with ice-cream, 
but rolled into rolls as small as a cigar, and so 
tight that you can readily suck through them. 
You put one of these into the bottom of the 
tumbler and imbibe the mixture as it slowly 
melts so as to arrive at the point of fluidity. 

The extreme temperance of the people of 
Madrid is very noteworthy. For those w T ho are 
not on the Prado there are open enormous cafes, 
where this same imbibing of sugared water, of 
lemonade, and of orchata is going on. We have 
no public rooms in Boston which approach the 
size of the largest of these coffee-houses, except- 
ing the great halls of the two Institutes. I do 
not say that men could not order spirit in these 
halls. I have no doubt they can. But they do 
not seem to, as our charming New England 
expression has it. They smoke, they sip sug- 
ared water, or they sip cool milk and water, and 
talk politics, by the hour. But they do not 
drink spirit or wine or beer. 

This excurstis of mine on the physical refresh- 
ments of the Prado has kept us so long from the 
matter which took us there, the daily drive, or 
procession, extending far into the evening, in 
which the Madrilenos and Madrilenas take the 
air, and see each other. 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 233 

In the broad driveway of the Prado are two 
lines of carriages moving in each direction, 
under a law of the road exactly like that on the 
Brighton road in winter. Only the inner lines, 
at the Prado, are not the carriages of the fast 
trotters ; they are the carriages of the King and 
Court and of the Diplomatic Corps. These and 
these only may ride there. Their footmen are 
distinguished by cockades which reveal the privi- 
lege. Indeed, I suppose the crests on the car- 
riages would show it. 

On the outside are two compact lines of car- 
riages moving along at an even pace, almost 
always open, and containing ladies and gentle- 
men in full dress. 

Gentlemen on horseback are scudding in and 
out, precisely as you may see them at Hyde 
Park in London. But the Prado is much longer 
than the largest drive in the Park, and the at- 
tendance of carriages is larger every day than I 
ever saw there, excepting on some special fes- 
tival. 

In fact, as I suppose, the Prado takes, to a 
large degree, the place of other social machin- 
ery. For three or four hours of every day you 
see your friends there. True, you only talk with 
those who are in your own carriage, or, if you are 
on horseback, you may engage in conversation, 
after a fashion, with those by whom you ride. 



234 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

I was in Madrid at the end of June. The days, 
of course, were at their longest, and the evening 
air was invariably soft and agreeable. Ladies 
rode in light summer costume, and wore hats, 
which they would not have worn in the morning 
in going to church. For a lady to have a hat 
on in church would be, I think, a certain sign 
that she was a foreigner. 

Somebody told me that a Spanish family 
whose fortunes were declining would endure any 
other pressure of poverty rather than the loss of 
carriage and horses. I was told that gentlemen 
or ladies would live in great penury, and even 
obscurity, if they could only keep up the daily 
ride in the Prado, and so retain the joy of seeing 
and being seen. This may be a mere guide- 
book story. I know very well how deceptive 
such sweeping statements are. But the number 
of carriages fitted simply for this purpose — 
open barouches, fit for those seeing and being 
seen — is certainly remarkable. I do not think 
that we approach it in Boston, which is a city of 
about the same population as Madrid, and, as I 
suppose, of much greater wealth. 

Shall we perhaps drop into a similar fashion 
here when the new Park begins to be attractive? 
Will the people who have handsome turnouts 
drive out on one side of Commonwealth Avenue, 
take a little turn in the Park, drive back on the 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 235 

other side, and repeat the same thing half a 
dozen times in the long summer afternoons and 
evenings of June? Shall we bow to Miss Cham- 
pernoun and touch our hats to the adorable 
Miss Krossandkrown ? Shall we smile sweetly 
on Mr. Holworthy as he rises in his stirrups, and 
lifts his hat wholly from his curls, or shall we 
make Mr. Fortinbras perfectly happy by invit- 
ing him to take the fourth seat in the carriage, 
because Papa's gout keeps him at home ? Qnien 
sabe ? 

There would be more chance of our going into 
this Prado life in Boston if June were a hundred 
and fifty days long, or if May were a little 
warmer. And, as things are, we hurry away 
before June is well over or even before May 
begins, to hide ourselves in Swampscott, the 
Shoals, or at Mt. Desert. It must be con- 
fessed, also, that we are very much afraid of 
each other, and distrust any approach to what 
the rest of the world call society. 

We were most kindly welcomed in one or two 
charming homes. Beyond this, so short a visit 
gives me no right to speak personally of do- 
mestic life. The habits of daily life, as they 
appear to a stranger, show the effect of cli- 
mate and religion ; but I suppose nice people 
are nice people everywhere, and the best so- 
cial life in Spain is probably much like the best 



236 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

social life anywhere else. The churches are open 
every day, and I think that women go to church 
almost daily. You meet in the streets, every 
morning, many with their maids, the mistress 
with prayer-book in hand, each wearing a man- 
tilla and not a hat or bonnet, which, as I have 
said, is not according to rule in church. 

The bookstores are well filled with good books 
and bad; and there is a good deal of activity 
in publication. The printing is good, the whole 
style of a book being quite up to that of the 
Paris workshops. 

I was inquiring for an impression of an old 
engraving of Murillo, very dear to me from 
early associations, when I was told to go for it 
to the establishment where it was engraved, the 
government engraving office, where they still 
had the plate, and still sold impressions. 

As the engraving was not much more than a 
hundred years old, it showed what an American 
I was, that I had not thought of this before. 

Accordingly I soon found myself there. The 
engraving offices occupy one flat in the Acad- 
emy of Fine Arts, on the street of Alcala, and 
here I found courteous and intelligent workmen, 
keeping up the traditions of the office admirably 
well, and ready and glad to sell the impressions 
of any of their plates at prices perfectly fair, 
which seemed to me very low. 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 237 

The establishment must have been founded, I 
think, as early as the days of Charles IV., the 
only king between Ferdinand and the present 
king who seems to have even attempted any- 
thing good. Collectors of prints will remember 
the series which represents the paintings in the 
Royal Gallery. Semla, among others, was a 
professor in the Academy here, and the plates 
of his work are in this collection. The office 
goes on its quiet way. They offered me proofs 
of the admirable print which they had just 
issued, from an engraving executed there of a 
great historical picture, now on exhibition at the 
palace. 

So in the midst of wars and rumors of wars — 
Napoleon, Joseph, Ferdinand — the office has 
worked on! "What matters it, — mob in Ma- 
drid, constitution or absolutism, — is the sun 
any less clear or is the graver any more blunt 
because the government has changed ? Let us 
strike a clean proof; that seems to be our busi- 
ness. " As I talked with these assiduous and 
courteous gentlemen, as I saw a workman pull a 
proof from a press which might have been there 
in 1782, I could not but remember what things 
abide and what things change. 

Of course the popular subjects have been 
often reproduced, and the popular prints are 
sadly worn. Such is the Madonna of the Fish, 



238 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

one of Semla's prints, and the price is accord- 
ingly. One or two francs will buy one of the 
badly worn impressions, which are but ghosts of 
what they were. 

But of subjects which are not specially agree- 
able, — I recollect, for instance, the Dwarfs of 
Velasquez, where there has been no pressing de- 
mand for impressions, — you find in their port- 
folios examples in good condition. 

They recognize entirely the competition of 
Laurent, the photographer, and the attractions 
of his admirable collection; and they have put 
the prices of their large collection of calcogra- 
fta into rivalry with the prices of photographs. 

Laurent's gallery of photographs, for such 
it really is, is one of the most interesting col- 
lections in the world. It contains two or three 
admirable photographs, many of very large size, 
and a visit there serves as an admirable refresh- 
ment to your memory of what you have seen, as 
well as a foretaste or suggestion of what you 
would like to see. All the subjects are land- 
scapes, buildings, people, or paintings in Spain 
or Portugal. 

Laurent has been more than twenty years in 
taking the negatives which are the foundations 
of this admirable collection. The catalogue of 
the pictures, a book of nearly two hundred 
pages, is in itself an index to the noblest monu- 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 239 

ments of Spanish art and Spanish antiquity. 
One of the indexes is an index by historical 
characters. If you wish to learn of Boabdil, you 
ask for ten pictures in this collection; if it is 
Charles V., you ask for eighty-seven ; and so on, 
so rich is it in the illustration of literature and 
history as well as of art. 

The photographs of paintings are, I think 
in all cases, taken from the paintings themselves, 
for better for worse. In Germany and in Italy 
the photographs are frequently taken from draw- 
ings in neutral tint, which have been accurately 
made for the purpose of being copied. But if 
you have one of Laurent's photographs, you 
have the picture itself, as far as the camera can 
give it. It seemed to me that Velasquez stood 
this severe test in most cases particularly well. 
Of course, as we all know, some colors confuse 
the photograph hopelessly. Velasquez's picture 
of Apollo and Vulcan comes out wretchedly. 
The blond Apollo is as black as the swarthy 
Vulcan. The print has been so popular, alas, 
that the swarthy Vulcan is now as white on the 
worn plate as the blond Apollo. For all this, 
I should be very grateful to any one who would 
present to me, or to the Fellowes Athenseum, a 
complete set of Laurent's copies from the pic- 
tures of the Museo der Prado. There are only 
five hundred and eighty-six of them. 



240 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The artists who have been sent as travellers 
on the several routes have made capital selec- 
tions. Every now and then they catch a group 
of peasants at work. Now it is a bit of a ruined 
arch or bridge; now it is a mass of prickly 
Indian fig, a bas-relief in an old church, a 
wonderfully wrought iron door, a railway tunnel, 
or a Roman statue. There is an admirable va- 
riety. You are all along reminded of Punch's 
admirable aphorism, that you can buy much 
better pictures than you can draw for yourself. 

Right under the lee of Madrid are certain 
excursions which I would commend to any other 
traveller, though, by misfortune, I did not take 
them myself. 

I should have been so glad to go to Alcala de 
Henares, which is only one hour and a half from 
Madrid. Ah me ! Ilium fuit. Alcala was the 
great university city of Spain. Yes, my dear 
George and my dear William, it was from the 
MSS. of this library that your beloved Complu- 
tensian Polyglot was made by this same Cardi- 
nal Ximenes, who, among other things, did his 
best to discover America, made permanent the 
Mozarabic Rite, gave his personal attention to 
Charles Ws missal, and has that lovely portrait 
in Prescott's Ferdinand and Isabella. Ah me ! 
if you knew what I know of this dreamy, schol- 
arly, drowsy old place, you would want as much 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 24 1 

as I do to go there and spend a week in 
dozing. 

They moved the university long ago to Ma- 
drid. They used up the precious MSS. of the 
Complutensian Polyglot to send home butchers' 
meat, as the curators of the Harvard Law School 
used up Lord Brougham's wig to fill up Holmes's 
Field with. And now Alcala, in perfect preser- 
vation, is an empty shell, from which even its 
lobster has removed. 

If any one cares, Complutum was the Roman 
city on the site of Alcala. And we will remark, 
in passing, that there are those who think that 
the " Doctor of Alcantara " should have been 
the " Doctor of Alcala," for " Alcantara " means 
" a bridge." 

The old university building stands, in perfect 
condition, though it is now only a memory of 
the university. 

The university, rival of Salamanca, was found- 
ed in 1498 by Cardinal Ximenes de Cisneros. 
The front is beautifully ornamented with sculp- 
tures. A medallion in the principal court repre- 
sents the Cardinal himself. He has a marshal's 
baton in one hand and the crucifix in the other. 
At the end of one of the courts is the Paraninfo, 
or hall where the degrees were conferred. This 
hall has lately been restored. 

The archiepiscopal palace of Alcald is a vast 
16 



242 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

building of wonderful workmanship. The sec- 
ond court is especially remarkable. The gallery, 
the columns which support it, and the stairway, 
are all wonderfully decorated. The door under 
the stairway is really a wonder of decoration. 
This building has within the last few years been 
carefully restored. Its vast halls, of which the 
old panelled ceilings are in a perfect state of 
preservation, now serve as a place of deposit for 
the royal archives. 

It is rather as a hint to other travellers that I 
say that the Magistrale Church is a beautiful 
specimen of Gothic architecture. Here is the 
tomb of the Cardinal Cisneros, which was for- 
merly in the chapel at the side of the university 
which he founded. This tomb, made of marble 
from Carrara, is the work of Dominico, the Flor- 
entine, and is one of the finest works of the kind 
to be seen in Spain. This church also possesses 
some tapestries and some pictures by Alonso 
del Arco, Juan de Sevilla, and Vincent Carducci. 

But the real charm of a visit to Alcala would 
be that one would see the framework of the pic- 
tures which Cervantes and Lope de Vega and 
the other playwrights and novelists construct, in 
which Spanish students play so large a part. 
The university of Madrid and that of Seville 
naturally take on the form of other European 
universities, but Alcala and its courts and clois- 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 243 

ters are all unchanged. The old mediaeval wall, 
flanked with towers of defence, may still be 
seen. 

They say that the printing of the polyglot 
Bible cost fifty-two thousand ducats. It was in 
six volumes, folio, and contained the Hebrew, 
the Septuagint, and the Vulgate of the Old 
Testament, with a Chaldaic paraphrase and the 
Greek and Latin of the New Testament. 

From Alcala, if I could, I would go half an 
hour further to Guadalajara. 

This old city is worth a visit, were it only to 
see the palace of the Dukes of l'lnfantado or of 
Osuna. This is a noble edifice, which has pre- 
served almost entirely its original splendor. It 
was built in 1461. The outside appearance is 
singular. The decoration of the front is perhaps 
a little heavy, but it fails neither in character 
nor originality. The patio , which has a double 
gallery supported by two rows of columns, is 
covered with a wonderful number of lions, whose 
tails are flying all abroad, eagles with outspread 
wings, fanciful creatures with griffins' bodies, and 
designs of all sorts in relief. This decoration 
extends to the roof of the second gallery, and 
has a marvellous effect. 

Inside the palace are large halls with panelled 
ceilings of the most curious work, which recall 
the Alhambra. The grand salon of Linajes, or 



244 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

of the descendants of the Mendozas, is specially 
remarkable. 

A vaulted wooden ceiling, formed in arches 
and gilded, gives the effect of stalactites. All 
around this hall was a frieze adorned with 
painted statues. These statues represent the 
ancestors of the family of the Duke of l'lnfan- 
tado. This is a curiosity of decoration such as 
can be seen nowhere else. 

On the side of the palace opening on the gar- 
den are also double galleries, supported by two 
rows of columns. There are simple arabesque 
designs wrought in the azulejos, or brilliant por- 
celain, of the Moors. These designs, though 
simple, are surprisingly effective. The upper 
gallery is ornamented with faiences from Tala- 
vera. 

But one cannot stay even among cordial 
friends, even in a charming climate, even in 
a city of museums, forever. Some of us were 
to be in London early in July. So far had the 
general statement, that Spain was a land of fevers 
and all sickness, affected our plans at the begin- 
ning of the summer. Others were to be in Swit- 
zerland in the summer months. And, indeed, in 
any event, we could not remain in Spain forever. 
But we should have almost to do this, were 
we to carry out the objects into which we went; 
were we to learn what the Spanish galleries of 



OUT-DOORS LIFE. 245 

art were to teach us, and extort the secrets as 
to the history of America yet written in their 
archives. 

So we hurried up the last purchases. For me, 
I bought only seventeen fans, for presents to 
friends who would like a Spanish fan. I wish I 
had bought seventy. I hardly dare tell the se- 
cret even to this silent page, that the day after 
my largest purchase the man who kept the fan- 
shop announced that he had received an admi- 
rable assortment from Switzerland and North 
America! Had I been buying fans which had 
been shipped from New York in the vessel I 
sailed in? 

We looked wildly for the lost umbrellas. We 
went to the Zinns and Sages of Madrid for 
trunks large enough to carry away the plunder 
of a peninsula. {Plunder is used in the Ken- 
tuckian sense, to denote the private property of 
a traveller, honestly acquired.) I had a long 
and sacred interview with an express agent, to 
whom I intrusted these trunks. " No, they need 
not go by grande vitesse, they might go by any 
vitesse which would bring them to London in 
three weeks. " 

Memorandum to the unwary : Seven weeks . 
from that day the trunks in question appeared 
in London. For Spain is the land of the manana ; 
that means, the to-morrow. 



246 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

" Blessed, kind to-morrow, 
He were a heathen not to worship thee." 

Certainly they do worship him there. 

And at last even the roll from the calcografia 
went into its trunk, and the copies from Velas- 
quez into theirs, and the last recalcitrant fan and 
Botelin de Documentos Ineditos went into theirs, 
and sturdy men bore them downstairs. And 
we tumbled into bed, to sleep till early daybreak, 
when we were to leave dear Madrid, perhaps 
FOREVER. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

ZARAGOZA. 

So we were up bright and early on the 22d of 
June! Madrid is on the parallel of 40 25', so 
that the 22d of June gives one an early chance 
to rise, even if he only rise with the sun. 

As we drove to the station, I noticed that 
bricklayers and other builders were as early as 
we. At six o'clock they were climbing their 
ladders and building their walls, and had been 
at it, I think, since five o'clock. At twelve they 
would stop work for three hours. I should think 
that, in the hot days of midsummer, our work- 
ingmen at home would like to do the same 
thing. From five to eleven and from three to 
seven seem to me better working hours than from 
seven to six, dropping an hour for dinner, when 
you talk of June and August. I knew a school- 
master once who let his boys come to him 
at four in the morning, so that school for the 
day was out at nine in summer. But this ec- 
centric man went " to the bad." I wonder if 
they did. 



248 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES, 

We were bound through to Zaragoza (the 
same thing as the Saragossa of Lord Byron, 
my aged friend) by what is called a " mixed 
line." A mixed line is the slowest thing there 
is, the derivation being that freight and passen- 
gers are taken in the same train. The loyal 
reader who has a long enough memory to recall 
any words which this author may have dropped 
early in our united journey, will remember that 
it has been already explained, that if you want 
to travel fast in Spain you must go at night. 
.Now we wanted, first of all, to see the country 
we went to see. We therefore went by day, 
though slowly. As to the heat of a midday ride, 
we must make the best of it. And I ought to 
say, writing nine months after, that I have no 
recollection of suffering from heat. It was noth- 
ing to the heat of days in which I have trav- 
elled here at home. As for the speed, we made 
three hundred and forty-one kilograms in thir- 
teen hours and a quarter, including all stops. 
This is an average of about sixteen miles an 
hour. 

On such a train as this at home the real incon- 
venience would probably be that you would 
have an indifferent car. But here you have the 
universal first-class carriage, of the English pat- 
tern. You almost persuade yourself that it is 
the private car in which you left Paris, which 



ZARAGOZA. 249 

has been in waiting for you at every station. 
But, in fact, the monogram of the special road is 
woven into the coach-lace of the upholstery. 

The courtesies of Spanish travelling are very 
pretty. If a Spanish gentleman in the compart- 
ment open his travelling-basket to take his al- 
mnerzo or his comida, he passes it round to all 
the passengers, to invite them to share. You 
break off a bit of biscuit, or take a strip of gin- 
ger, to show that you appreciate the compliment. 
So with a paper of bon-bons. It would be 
thought a little greedy to open the paper and 
devour them in your own party, without offering 
them to all the strangers in the compartment. 

Madrid itself is in the midst of a high plain, 
sandy and barren, and the public gardens and 
parks which make the few pleasure drives are 
maintained, I fancy, by a good deal of labor. 
The poor little river Manzanares is made to fur- 
nish water for the whole. Around the city, on 
almost every side, are gray, rocky hills, gener- 
ally quite as bare as the tops of the White 
Mountains, and nearly half as high above the 
sea. It is two thousand four hundred and fifty 
feet above the sea level. As I first entered Ma- 
drid, on a drizzly morning, from the north, I re- 
membered so well Morton's repeated ejaculation, 
as in a pelting rain we rode to the top of Mount 
Washington, which he had never seen before : — 



250 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

" When, therefore, ye shall see the abomina- 
tion of desolation, let him that readeth under- 
stand." 

" Abomination of desolation " is none too 
strong for these Castilian hills. 

Through these hills the railroad winds its 
way, in a general northeast direction, till you 
have passed Alcala and Guadalajara, of which I 
have already spoken. After these you soon be- 
gin on a down grade, to run, still northeast, by a 
somewhat winding route, and enter Aragon. 

The Castilian peasantry have the reputation 
of laziness equal to their pride. As soon as you 
are in Aragon you see the result of faithful, 
hard work. I do not know. What I do not 
know is this : whether the Castilians are lazy 
because their country is barren, or whether their 
country is barren because the Castilians are lazy. 
One of Dr. Holmes's best stories, for which the 
diligent reader will perhaps search vainly, is 
of a fellow who sold hair-oil on the steps of the 
medical college in Paris, and displayed, as a test 
of its excellence, the most magnificent head of 
hair. " What I do not know/' Dr. Holmes says, 
" is whether the man sold the hair-oil because he 
had that fine head of hair, or whether he had the 
fine head of hair because he used the hair-oil. ,, 

The passage from Castile to Aragon is from 
Isabella's kingdom to Ferdinand's. " From arid 



ZARAGOZA. 251 

Castile to fertile Aragon " is the guide-book 
slang. What this means seems to be, from Cas- 
tile, where a set of stupid bigots lived, to Ara- 
gon, where a set of ingenious and industrious 
Moors had introduced irrigation, agriculture, and 
their consequences. This may be unjust in me. 
But we love our dear Moors, and could weep 
for Boabdil and his ejection. There is but one 
God, and Spain does not seem to have flour- 
ished much since she turned out a people who 
put this statement in the front rank of such 
knowledge as they had. 

It was tantalizing to hurry by Alcala and 
Guadalajara, and to have to satisfy ourselves 
with such sketches as we could make, while this 
and that part of our " mixed train " was shunted 
off, and we left, now in sight of a cathedral, 
now in the shelter and shade of a water-tank. 

Some fifty miles northeast of Guadalajara 
you come to Siguenza, another place which has 
a picturesque look, tempting you to stay over. 
But we must content ourselves with Laurent's 
general view. Perhaps our learned and in- 
telligent friend Mr. Richardson, close on our 
tracks, and knowing how to study the Roman- 
esque in northern Spain, will bring home some- 
thing from this quaint old Roman church. The 
guide-book speaks of two seminaries in Siguenza, 
whatever they may be. 



252 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

No one had taken the trouble, when I studied 
geography, to tell me that there was any such 
place in the world as Calatayud. Or, perhaps, 
did I never study the geography of Spain? 

Did it perhaps happen, in those dreamy days 
of the Latin School, when we were ordered 
down into the basement, once in four months, to 
" study English " under Mr. Benjamin or some 
other unfortunate, — did it perhaps happen that, 
in the determination by the class, as to where 
we left off four months before, we squarely 
omitted " Spain " among us ? Is this possibly 
the reason why all Spain seems so much like the 
planet Mars to me? 

If studying geography amounted to much, I 
ought to be most at home in Greenland and 
Labrador; for the custom of new teachers is 
to order a new book and bid the boys begin 
again. I can remember, therefore, beginning 
many, many times on North America, which, 
with true loyalty, stands at the beginning of all 
American geographies. More time, therefore, 
has been spent on my information as to Green- 
land and Labrador, so far as school-work went, 
than anybody chose to give to London or Paris. 

As virtually nothing is known about either 
country, I have a right to say I know about all 
there is known. So much for the jargon of the 
geographical text-books. 



ZARAGOZA. 253 

Forgive this excursus, dear reader, and let us 
return to Calatayud. 

At this point I send over to the Fellowes 
Athenaeum for Poitou's journey through Spain. 
Perhaps he saw more of Calatayud than I did. 

Alas ! what a corrective is one traveller for 
another. He went by rail to Madrid from Zara- 
goza, just the reverse of our route. This Ara- 
gon, which we found so interesting, seemed to 
him just the reverse. " The road from Sara- 
gossa to Madrid is uninteresting, but the country 
is not without character.'' I should think not. 
All he saw of Calatayud was " its semi-oriental 
silhouette on the bluish background of its double 
mountains." 

Then he came to Alhama, — and here its 
translator expatiates on Byron's ballad, " Wo is 
me, Alhama ! " — and bids us read the details 
of the siege in Prescott. Let us hope that this 
reader has done so. But, alas ! that Alhama is, 
as the bird flies, rather more than three hundred 
miles from this Alhama, and this reader of ours 
has already dilated with the right emotion re- 
garding Byron's ballad. Alhama means " the 
baths," and there are a dozen Alhamas. 

Such are the dangers, dear reader, of dilating 
with the wrong emotion, regarding which your 
faithful Mentor has warned you, before now. I 
remember a friend who, by misfortune, dilated 



254 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

on Barbara Frietchie's window at Fredericks- 
burg, when he should have dilated at Fredericks 
Town. Against such danger the Mentor and 
the intelligent reader will guard with care. 

Very well. Nobody, I say, had taken the 
pains to tell me that there was any such place 
as the quaint Moorish town Calatayud. . The 
Moorish quarter still exists in the defiles of the 
hills. The tower of San Andres is bright with 
azulejos. A fine castle domineers over the rest. 

If anybody cares, the name should be Cala- 
tayub, with a b at the end, which means the 
castle of Job, one Ayub or Job having built 
it. But this is not the Job of the boils, camels, 
wife, and friends. It is the nephew of Musa, if 
intelligent readers happen to remember him. 
This Job, being sent by Musa to build a frontier 
post here, built this " castle o' Job," around 
which grows this city. He built it from the 
stone of Bilbilis, where, as the reader may or may 
not remember, the poet Martial was born. It is 
from this place that Martial growls to Juvenal 
'that he wishes he could live and die in Rome. 
" Bilbilis, proud of her gold and her iron, makes 
me a rustic here," — a rustic in a place where a 
toga was unknown. 

The arms of the city are a Celtiberian, riding 
without stirrups and with a lance. The pride of 
Aragon begins to appear. 



ZARAGOZA. 255 

The Dominican convent has a fine three-story 
patio, in which some Moorish work may still be 
seen. 

I think I could dream away a day or two at 
the Fonda del Issuro, even if there were no togas 
in Calatayud. 

But perhaps the charm to us is that we stop 
as the sun begins to go down, and the shadows 
grow long. All nature is so much more lovely 
with long shadows ! 

And all the Spanish stations are so pictu- 
resque. Was it here, perhaps, that we tempted 
the children down with their fresh apricots from 
the orchard, when they were a little afraid to 
come lest the Fonda people might not be 
pleased? Remember, dear reader, that every 
child of them all is a picture, which, for mere 
oddity of costume, you would stand gazing at 
for five minutes if you found it at a loan exhibi- 
tion of the Art Club. 

The country is very picturesque. " Not with- 
out character," indeed. In thirteen miles after 
you pass toward Calatayud from Medinaceli 
(which has nothing to do with heaven), you go 
through twenty tunnels, so broken is the whole 
region. The Duke of Medinaceli, you know, 
is a very high nobleman, " rightful heir to the 
throne of Spain, " as those say who know what 
are the rights in that business. Medinaceli 



256 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

meant originally City of Selim, or Province of 
Selim, — Medina meaning a jurisdiction, or prov- 
ince, or city, if you are up in your Arabic, dear 
reader. 

But Medinaceli was the other side of Cala- 
tayud, and we must not stop to talk ; we must 
forge on to Zaragoza. 

And we arrive, after another of these wonder- 
ful sunsets, just as the darkness creeps on. The 
gentry of the town are still driving round and 
round the public park. 

Aragon was the kingdom of Ferdinand. His 
marriage with Isabella united it to Castile. It 
was a set of thoroughly independent people, and 
the local independence still subsists. When a 
king visits them, they make a point of showing, 
somehow, that they do not forget their old priv- 
ileges. It is here that belongs the famous old 
formula of coronation, so often cited : — 

" We, every one of whom is as good as you, 
and who all together are much better than 
you, swear to obey you as our king so long as 
you respect our rights and privileges. If not, 
NO." 

This superb oath was submitted to by the 
Spanish kings, when they came into Aragon, 
until the middle of the seventeenth century. 
The traces of that feeling are to be seen every- 
where in Aragon to this hour. 



ZARAGOZA. 257 

Aragon consists of three provinces, Huesca, 
Zaragoza, and Teruel. The kingdom is divided 
by the Ebro into equal parts, and consists of the 
southern slope of the Pyrenees and the northern 
slope of the Idabeda Mountains. There is talk 
of a direct line from Madrid to Paris, over a 
route just now opened to the diligence. 

Ours was the first party which went from Ma- 
drid to Paris on this completed diligence road. 
Whenever the railroad shall be pushed through, 
Zaragoza, now a thriving town of say 70,000 peo- 
ple, will be a place of even more importance. 

We went at once to an inn which, with some 
pretence at Italian customs, was virtually Span- 
ish, and here we spent thirty hours or more 
very pleasantly. For certain annoyances, in the 
absence of arrangements which the nineteenth 
century has invented, one must make up his 
mind once for all in Spain ; but as for the eter- 
nities of neatness, obligingness, deference, and a 
knowledge of his place by every man concerned 
in the inn, and of her place by every woman, I 
found these central necessities in every fonda 
I visited. For my part, I prefer to try the dis- 
tinctively Spanish inns, and not those which are 
called English, French, or Italian. 

Every inch of Zaragoza is curious. I remem- 
ber a walk among good-natured people, selling 
their fruits and vegetables in the market-place, 

17 



258 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

as being quite as interesting to me as any 
Madonna of the Pillar. Here was I, with three 
ladies, of all four of whom the costume was al- 
most as remarkable to the Zaragozans as that of 
four Chippewa Indians would be in the market 
of Detroit. And these nice people were not 
obtrusive in their curiosity, were good-natured 
to our execrable Spanish, and at every point, 
without knowing it, showed us curiosities which 
we had never seen before. Why, I went into 
a twine-shop, and bought some red pack- 
thread, of which I have some to-day. (Thanks 
to a high protective tariff, it was the cheapest 
packthread and the best I ever saw.) The 
shop, if it were in Tremont Street, would be 
visited as a curiosity ; or, if I could put it into 
the Old South Church, the fee for admission to 
see it would make up the annual income needed 
by the custodians of that monument. 

The four regulation lions of Zaragoza are, 
however, not twine-shops nor market-places, but 
the cathedral, the church of El Pilar, the leaning 
tower, and the bridge and fortifications. 

Does the intelligent reader perhaps remember 
the puppet-show at which Don Quixote assisted, 
in which the famous Don Gayferos came to the 
assistance of the Princess Melisendra? 

Well, the Princess Melisendra was imprisoned 
in a tower in Zaragoza, of which the other name 



ZARAGOZA. 259 

was Sansuenna. Zaragoza, if anybody cares, is 
a modern corruption from Caesarea- Augusta. If 
the reader remembers, the Princess lowered her- 
self down from the tower and caught on the 
balcony by her brocade dress. Don Gayferos 
found her hanging, and, regardless of the injury 
to the brocade, the book says, he pulled her 
down from the iron rail, put her astride on the 
crupper of his saddle, and took her in triumph 
to Paris, across the mountains. By that very 
route to Paris you are to accompany us, gentle 
reader, and I will not swear that the tower in 
which she was imprisoned was not the veritable 
leaning tower of Zaragoza of to-day. Let us 
rather say this stands on the place of that, as 
this is called the new tower, and was, in fact, 
built in 1504. Melisendra, on her part, was the 
daughter of Charlemagne, so far as she had any 
real existence. 

The guide-books say that the foundation of 
the tower settled on one side, and that the lean- 
ing is, therefore, accidental. I do not believe 
this. I think it was built to lean. The artists 
of our party wanted to go up, and I accompa- 
nied them to the place, meaning to sit at the 
bottom. But the ascensus proved so facilis that 
I went on and on, till we were at the top. It is 
about as high as Bunker Hill Monument. 

It was very curious to look straight down the 



260 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

sloping side, and see the tops of dogs and men 
and horses. A few years ago the architects got 
frightened about it; so they built a new wall 
about the bottom, where it would not show out- 
side, and shaved off the projections which once 
were at the top. But I do not think this made 
much difference. Anyway, our two hundred 
kilograms, more or less, of weight did not 
make it tremble. 

There are practically two cathedrals in Zara- 
goza, for this reason: — there is the cathedral of 
La Seo, which means the cathedral of the See, a 
fine and ancient building, in which Ferdinand 
the Catholic was baptized in 1456. Parts of the 
building are very much older. This cathedral 
would answer every purpose. But very early in 
the history of the religion the Virgin Mary 
descended visibly upon a certain pillar, still 
extant, and gave word that the place was under 
her direction. She did her worship here for 
some time daily. Naturally, a church built 
itself around this pillar, and it became a place 
of devotion, even pilgrimage, of special interest. 
At some time in the sixteenth century, I believe, 
some royal person ■ — but I think I never knew 
who — took interest enough to pull down the 
old church, which was, perhaps, burned, and 
build a bigger in its place, and to give word that 
this also should be a cathedral. 



ZARAGOZA. 261 

So you have a chance to see how badly the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries did this 
sort of thing, in comparison with the admirable 
success of the earlier centuries, when they had 
the same thing to do. The pillar itself is the 
central point of an altar, in a beautiful chapel 
of its own. It is of reddish marble, and has a 
sort of extinguisher over it, made of I know not 
what. A priest was at his devotions before it 
and some fifty of the people, while in the larger 
coro hard by the choir of priests, and I sup- 
pose the bishop, were carrying on High Mass. 
For the first time in Spain I heard here at 
Mass a single boy's clear soprano voice in some 
part of the service. We could see from where 
we were none of those in the coro. But this 
clear treble, alternating with the heavy bass of 
the chorus, had a musical effect very interesting, 
and I need not say that I did my best to trans- 
late it into devotion. 

Something similar was going on in the other 
cathedral, which is truly noble ; and here in 
Zaragoza there are a considerable number of 
people who pass in and out to their daily 
prayers in these churches. You do not have 
that grewsome feeling that these are only a set 
of drummers at work, keeping up the daily 
drumbeat round the world, so that some one 
may be able to say that there is a continuous 



262 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

drumbeat. You really feel that somebody here 
takes some vital interest in the service. 

I saw no monument of the Maid of Zaragoza 
or of Palafox, who conducted the defence with 
so much spirit against the French in 1808. 

But the old wall still exists on the river-side, 
and marks of the attack and defence are every- 
where shown. 

I shall remember Zaragoza for a sort of wide- 
awake freshness, which would seem to show that 
the wind of the Pyrenees often blows through 
the street. The wide-awake independence of 
what was virtually a republic still lives in these 
people, who seem energetic and prosperous. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

NORTHWARD. 

And how does this reader know that he has 
not been lured thus far to his ruin? Has he not, 
indeed, arrived at Zaragoza, with no sure pros- 
pect that he will ever leave that city? Are not 
these guides of his, four wild madcaps, led by 
a tall round-shouldered man, with a civil tongue 
in his head, who speaks very bad Spanish, and 
who knows of no route by which the reader 
shall come home? For, of course, no one in his 
senses ever returns by the route by which he 
went. 

To confess the whole truth to this loyal reader, 
all this excursion to Zaragoza was based on a 
perhaps. 

It might be that there was some road across 
the Pyrenees by which the party of four, and 
the reader faithfully following, could come to 
Pau, without going round by Marseilles, and 
without returning by Biarritz, by which route, 
as the reader may possibly remember, we all 
entered Spain. 



264 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

With regard to this possible route across the 
Pyrenees the authorities were few, inconsistent, 
and not recent 

First, and best authenticated, was that cele- 
brated march of Charlemagne in the year 779, 
or thereabouts, when his rear guard was cut off 
at Roncesvalles, and Roland killed, as the reader 
may remember. 

Second, not quite so well authenticated, was 
this flight of the Princess Melisendra on the 
crupper of Don Gayferos's saddle, as seen by 
Don Quixote and Sancho Panza in the puppet- 
show. 

With regard to both of these expeditions, it 
was to be observed that they were made in the 
saddle, and there was no evidence that the trav- 
ellers had each a trunk or trunk-mail, weighing 
just up to the regulations of the Spanish luggage- 
vans, which also must cross the Pyrenees. 

Whether the passage of one thousand one 
hundred and three years had expanded the road 
across the Pyrenees so far that one could go in 
any sort of jumble-cart with these trunks on 
board? This was question No. I. 

Or whether, outside of ballads, Charlemagne 
and Melisendra did not carry boxes of plunder 
as big as these regulation trunks, and whether 
such trunks could not be attached to the backs 
of mules, in like wise, in 1882? This was ques- 
tion No. 2. 



NORTHWARD. 265 

But why did they not look in Murray or 
O'Shea? says the captious reader, with his feet 
on a leg-rest, removing his cigar from his mouth 
that he may interrupt. 

Idiot ! Of course they did. And of course, 
be it said with reverence, both the guide-books 
failed them. Vague intimations there were that 
" this route must be made on horseback ; " " the 
route hence must be ridden" which means the 
same thing. But who should say whether thirty- 
five miles of such riding were to be practicable 
for women, or whether the trunks would or 
would not drop off behind, as the mules clam- 
bered vertically. 

For myself, I went to the Madrid office of the 
Panticosa baths. Now the Panticosa baths are 
a sort of miniature Saratoga, up in the Pyrenees, 
advertised as widely as Spain knows how. 

" Did the senor (at the office) know whether 
the routes to and from Panticosa were practica- 
ble to wheel carriages ? " 

The senor knew nothing about it, and won- 
dered that any other senor cared. But as the 
senor extranjero did care, he would certainly 
learn at the bureau of the railway which led to 
Huesca. To this bureau the foreign senor hied ; 
and he asked the same question : " Did the 
senor," &c. 

It could not be that there were any wheel car- 



266 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

riages. It was probably impossible. Still there 
were certainly diligences which went somewhere 
from Huesca. But what was most certain was 
that it could make no possible difference to 
anybody whether there were any or whether 
there were not. Why should the foreign senor 
disturb himself on such a merely abstract 
question? 

Indeed, were we not all in Madrid; and why 
should we not stay there? 

It was at this juncture that the foreign senor, 
who is this writer, finding himself on the tail of 
a street rail-car in Madrid with an English gen- 
tleman whom he never saw before and never has 
seen since, asked him if he supposed there was a 
practicable road for wheels between Jaca in the 
mountains and the French valleys north of them. 
The Englishman thought there must be. " There 
was none when I was there," he said ; " but that 
was in the Carlist war, when I was an officer 
there. They must have pushed something 
through since then." 

I said I .had three ladies with me, and four 
trunks. 

" If I were you," said the cordial Englishman, 
to whom at this distance of time I present my 
thanks again, " I should go." 

And we went. Let me say, in advance, that 
the plan was not developed by my prudence, but 



NORTHWARD. 267 

by the ingenuity and audacity of my compan- 
ions. And, as the reader sees, but for this plan, 
however it turns out, none of us would have seen 
Zaragoza, this wide-awake, lively Worcester-sort 
of a place, which runs back to Augustus Caesar, 
and yet is quite up to any of the ingenuities or 
enterprises of to-day. 

Be it observed, however, that in leaving Zara- 
goza, on the morning of St. John's Day, we knew 
no more whether there were a practicable route 
across the Pyrenees than we knew when we left 
Boston. And I think no one in Zaragoza was 
any wiser than we. 

St. John's Day was probably once the longest 
day in the year. If anybody ask you why it is 
not now, say, " Precession of the equinoxes," and 
that will shut him up. That is an excellent spell 
when there is any question about the calendar. 
If he gasp out any other inquiry, say, " Council 
of Nice," and he will succumb. 

Because it is the longest day in the year, or 
was, various rites more or less Ethnic — or, with 
a Cockney aspirate, Heathen-ic — still hang 
around St. John's Day. One of these rites, I 
know not what, required several score of the 
old women of Zaragoza to sit all night on the 
curb-stones of the sidewalks, in front of our 
hotel, looking upon the public park. When I 
went to bed they were there, when I woke in the 



268 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

night I heard them chattering there, and when 
the sun rose in the morning they were there. 

Let me hope they had vervain. 

Why they were there I do not know, but that 
it was the eve of St. John's Day. 

And for us, we took the train toward Barce- 
lona, to which, alas ! we could not go. At a 
junction not many miles out of town we left this 
train and confided ourselves to the hotter and 
slower mercies of a mixed train, which was to 
take us to Huesca. 

Is it not curious, dear reader, that I should feel 
so sorry for you, that you do not know where 
Huesca is, that you do not even care, and that 
you never heard of it before? I cannot say I 
am ashamed for you. No, I certainly am not. 
There is nothing disgraceful in ignorance of 
Huesca. But now it seems to me, of course, 
that people should be well acquainted with 
Huesca. I am like the middy who used to say, 
" You have been at Port-au-Prince, I suppose? " 
because it was the only place he had touched at 
in his only cruise. How strange it is that, on the 
1st of April, 1882, I who write these lines was 
in that gross ignorance of utter darkness about 
Huesca, and was not ashamed, more than if I 
had been in Paradise. 

" Don't you know daddy ?" said the school- 
boy; " why, it is as easy as nothing to know 
daddy." 



NORTHWARD. 269 

Huesca, my dear and ignorant friend, — more 
dear to me because of my own ignorance and 
yours, — was once, it seems, the capital of a 
kingdom, if in those days the word "king" ex- 
isted, or anything corresponding to it. As long 
ago as Sertorius, whom you may remember in 
Viri Romae, — that is to say, seventy-five years 
before the Christian era, — that same Sertorius 
had an establishment here, where he kept noble 
youths, and educated them, they being, in fact, 
hostages for their fathers' good behavior. In 
memory of this boarding-school of his, the uni- 
versity at this hour is called the University 
Sertorio. 

As in other countries, the literary atmosphere 
of the university does not percolate through the 
windows of the hotel. I am quite sure that the 
only book in that hotel was a translation into 
Spanish of the letters of Napoleon the First, 
which letters I read, through my siesta hours, 
not for the first time. Excellent reading they 
are. There was also a Spanish pamphlet, per- 
haps on sewing-machines, which some drum- 
mer had left. And so clear was it to all parties 
that no such thing belonged there, that, when 
we left, at the last moment, a maid rushed down- 
stairs, stopped the diligence, and passed the 
tract into the hands of one of the ladies. For 
all that, it was a decent hotel, and we fared well 



270 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

there during the heated term of mid-day. It was 
the hottest day I spent in Spain. 

Strange to say, no one knew about crossing 
into France. We could go to Jaca; we could 
go to Panticosa, — to either place by diligence. 
Beyond, the mountain wall was like the moun- 
tain wall of a fairy tale. Had any one ever 
crossed? Quien sabe ? Or how did they cross? 
Quien sabe ? This is certain, that, if they did 
cross, they never returned. Why should the 
senor and the sefioras inquire? Why should 
they care? 

Well, they did not care much. But, anyway, 
they could, would, and did go as far as Jaca. 

" But, surely, dear Mr. Hale, you are not 
going to make us start without telling us some- 
thing about Huesca?" 

Not much. What good ? If I told you about 
the alabaster retablo, would you remember it 
three days? It is not as if you saw it with your 
eyes. How queer it is that my afternoon walk in 
Huesca should bring up the memories of a drive 
in Ipswich, in Essex County. Few places can 
be less alike ! I will compromise with you, loyal 
reader, I will tell you a little story about Huesca. 
And then, just before sunset, we will climb to 
the coupe of the diligence, and will all be 
gone. 



NORTHWARD. 271 



DON RAMIRO, THE MONK-KING. 

" Please do not go, papa," said the pretty 
Inez. "You promised me that we might have 
the birds out to-day. And I have kept this a 
secret, papa, but I will tell you now. Every 
day for a week I have started a flight of herons, 
when I forded the brook by Sancho's. I have 
saved them for you, papa." 

Her father kissed the pretty girl. " You know 
how glad I should be to take out the hawks, and 
how glad I always am to ride with my pet. But 
we must put it off again. The old fool has sum- 
moned us to council. And it is so long since he 
has done us this honor, that we must go. He 
does not ask us to council when he wants to tax 
our cattle ; but now that he is going to cast a 
bell, his faithful lords are summoned. Good- 
by, sweetheart." And he kissed her, and 
jumped into his saddle. 

" But, papa, you are not armed ! " 

" Armed ! I should think not, for a five-mile 
ride. Why, darling, I shall be back before sun- 
set." 

" But, papa," said the girl in tears, drawing 
her last arrow, " I had such a bad dream last 
night." 

" I will kiss it away," said the laughing horse- 



272 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

man ; and he bent and kissed the girl, and with 
his attendants rode off to the city. 

As he entered the council-hall an hour after, 
a Celtiberian giant, hid behind the door, swung 
his heavy double-handed sword with a skilful 
curve through the air, and the head of the 
Count Manresa fell upon the marble. 

"Is not this a sudden call?" said the Mar- 
chioness of Barbastro to her husband, the same 
morning, as he pulled to pieces the fowl before 
him, while his horse neighed at the door. 

"Sudden? Yes — or no. It is sudden now, 
because we are called at daybreak to be at the 
palace at noon. But he should have summoned 
his council two years ago. So he has been long 
waiting." 

" I wish I were not so nervous," said the 
Marchioness. " If you went to court oftener I 
should be more used to it. You have no gorget." 

" No, the thing scratched me, and I took it off. 
This is only a bit of ceremony, — something 
about the cathedral. I wish you would tell Juan 
to take all the lining out from that Lerida gorget 
and put in something clean and soft. Good-by. 
You need not sit up for me." 

So the Marquis joined the Count of Lerida, 
and they rode to Huesca, saying ugly things 
about their monk-king, but glad that even cere- 



NORTHWARD. 273 

mony brought together the council again. Their 
attendants chaffed each other and chattered, as 
a staff will. 

Arrived at the palace, they found Manresa's 
attendants in waiting. Excepting him, they 
were first. 

Together they entered the patio, Lerida was 
in full armor, and he was detained a moment 
by a question from the chamberlain. Barbastro 
passed on into the council-chamber; the Celti- 
berian swung his sword again, and another head 
fell on the floor. 

For Lerida, a stout son of the soil tripped 
him from behind. The instant he was on the 
ground a heavy axe fell, and his head was 
thrown into the council-room. 

Three gallant Knights ride down the Road, 

They use nor Spur nor Rein ; 
In Laugh and Jest they little bode 
That, on this Way their Steeds have trod, 

They turn not back again. 

They laugh and chat along the Way, 

These noble Lords of Spain ; 
No haste to go, no care to stay, 
A dusty Road, a sunny Way, 
And little heed the Three that they 

Will ne'er go back again. 

" Groom, take this Horse ; Boy, feed him well," — 

Ah me ! a Caution vain ! 
Yet not one warning Voice to tell 
18 



274 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

How ends this Council of the Bell, 
How each man falls beneath the Spell, 
And goes not back again ! 

A flashing Axe, a headsman's Sword, 

Three falling Trunks, and then, 
With never Prayer or shriving Word, 
Lies stark in Death each laughing Lord, 
And none goes back again. 



And so you may go on, gentle reader, accord- 
ing to your skill in telling short stories, if by 
any good luck this be your profession. The 
time is the year 1136. The King of Huesca is 
the monk-king, as he was called, Ramiro. He 
has conceived a dislike for the nobles of his 
kingdom, and he has summoned sixteen of them 
to a council, that they may determine how to 
make a bell of which the sound may be heard 
through Aragon. By the ingenious device of 
grouping the noblemen, which you have followed 
in my three little stories, I have told you what 
befell the first six who appeared at the council. 

But I had rather not tell, in equal detail, the 
fate of the next nine. You can do that for your- 
self, according to your own method. Only, 
when they arrive at the palace, the head of each 
man must be cut off, and you must so manage 
this that the reader shall be quite surprised. In- 
deed, it should not be done twice in the same 
way, if you can help it. 



NORTHWARD. 275 

You might have one party of four and one of 
five. Or you might have the first party five, 
and the second four. Or some writers would 
have three parties of three each ; in that case 
I should have one approach by the road from 
Monte-Aragon, and another from the Ermita de 
San Miguel, and another from the distant Tardi- 
enta. I would have these late; and I would 
have Tardienta named from that lateness of 
theirs. 

I would have a ferryman caution the first party 
that there will be a storm before long, and that 
they had better go back without crossing. Then 
Don Baltazar can curse him by his gods, and 
Don Melchior can bid him stick to his last, 
and Don Clement can slip an angel into his 
hand. And he can put a hole through this 
angel, and his daughter's daughter's daughter 
can wear it to this day. Perhaps the second 
party can see a flight of ravens, if you can 
manage their croakings so as to be quite differ- 
ent from the ferryman's. And the third party 
can be hindered all along the road; but the 
Marquis of Tardienta shall cry that Satan him- 
self is not strong enough to stop him nor cun- 
ning enough. 

Settle these details as you will ; but have all 
the fifteen heads cut off before noon of that 
bloody day. Now I will finish the story. 



2^6 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

" Drag away the carrion," said the bad abbot 
Frotardo, who had committed all this wickedness. 
And the brutes dragged away the still bodies to 
a field behind the castle. And they brought 
forth sawdust and scattered it on the stones of 
the patio. And the bad abbot sent out oats for 
the horses, and water and cups of wine and 
loaves of bread for the squires and grooms who 
were sitting in the shade of the palace in front. 
And he sent them word that the council would 
be long, and that their masters would eat their 
comida together. 

But the bad abbot said to the monk-king, 
" Has the devil taken Tizon before his time? 
Why does not he come?" 

Ah me ! there was no hope for Tizon. He 
was late because his groom was late and his 
squire was late, and when he came to the ferry 
the ferryman was on the other side; for, as 
you have been told, he had crossed over with 
Don Clement and Don Melchior and Don Balta- 
zar. Then Tizon had tried a short cut through 
the meadow, and his horse had been stalled, and 
his squire had scarcely dragged him out again ; 
and they had been fain to return to the trav- 
elled road again. But at last they had arrived 
at the palace. 

And, lo ! the grooms were feasting in the shade 
and drinking from the wine-skins. And the 



NORTHWARD. 2JJ 

horses had their bits slipped from their mouths, 
and were eating the oats from nose-bags. 

" The council still sits, my Lord," said Sebas- 
tian, whom Tizon knew well. He was the squire 
of Cervera, his nearest neighbor. 

" So much the better for me if they are dis- 
cussing such matters as their squires have in 
hand," said the nobleman, laughing. 

" Pshaw, I am stiff with riding. To say truth, 
I am not in the habit of coming to councils." 
And with this jest he pushed aside the curtain, 
and stepped forward alone to the patio. 

The King himself, in a robe of ceremony, met 
him. 

" Welcome, my Lord," said the false monarch. 
" You are late, but welcome." 

Don Pedro hated the King; but he loved 
ceremony, and was easily flattered. " Your 
Majesty does me too much honor." 

" Diego, Jeronimo, take off my cousin's ar- 
mor. Your Grace will not relish our simple fare 
if you are stiff with iron. Or would you wish 
for water? " 

But Monteagudo — that was his barony — 
declined, and followed the King into the coun- 
cil-chamber. The King pointed to the ceiling, 
where in a horrid circle were arranged the fif- 
teen bloody heads which had first fallen. 

" This is the bell which we have been found- 



278 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

ing, my Lord," said the King, " and your head 
shall hang in the centre. With such a bell and 
such a tongue I think all Aragon will hear. " 

From that day to this, this vault has been 
called " The Bell," and the traveller may see it 
to-day. 

No, dear reader, I would not have told that 
horrid story in this jesting way had I believed 
one word of it. 

The room is there ; and it is called " The 
Bell." That is quite foundation enough for a 
Spanish legend, if you have only eight hundred 
and fifty years to spin it out. 

If you ask me, I think the name of the 
vault has given rise to the story. And I do not 
think that the story has given rise to the name 
of the vault. 

But if you ask me again why the vault was 
called " La Campana," or " The Bell," there you 
are too much for me. Quien sabef 



CHAPTER XIX. 

JACA. 

And you must not stay here chattering on the 
public square. Here are all the diligences ready, 
and half Huesca is here to see us start The 
nice girl, as above, runs down with the sewing- 
machine book, if indeed it were not a Pathfinder 
guide. The host and the hostess wish us a pleas- 
ant journey, and we wish them happy lives. 
Another of those charming diligence rides be- 
gins, such as I have tried to describe before. 
Yes, it is the very road which Melisendra trotted 
over, fearing the Moors behind ; but now it is a 
perfect highway. In Huesca all the people come 
out in admiration to witness our departure, and 
well they may. The eight mules run like fury, 
though the course is all uphill. Then comes 
such a sunset as no man ever described, or will ; 
and then, in the northeast, the moon, not full, 
but large enough for us. Why will no one tell 
us what are those wonderful lines in Schiller's 
Robbers, how the moon rises when the sun goes 
down? 



280 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

" Because we are in Spain. You must not 
quote Schiller's Robbers in Spain. " 

Might you quote Don Carlos? 

" Perhaps" — "Why not" — "Are you going 
to sleep?" "Asleep in this moonlight — moon- 
light — moonlight." 

Somebody is asleep. They have all stopped 
chattering. I believe they are all asleep. 

They certainly are. 

Whether we sleep or wake, the eight mules 
forge on and the soft moon shines. And at last 
the morning. The " mist of dawning gray " be- 
gins to " dapple into day," and you know that 
the miracle of life is to be renewed. The road 
passes along by a strange battlemented wall, — • 
yes, Charlemagne passed that same wall, and 
other princes near a thousand years before him. 
Marcus Porcius Cato, your old friend of the 
Latin Reader and of Viri Romae, built it some 
two hundred years before the Christian era. 

A few guards at the gate of the little city, to 
ask the proper questions about luggage, and 
then down the ladder we all climbed, with our 
wealth of hand-bags and of umbrellas and 
paint-boxes and drawing-blocks, and began to 
intercede with the Fonda people of Jaca for 
lodgings. 

Perfectly civil were these people, but perfectly 
inflexible. Lodgings ! The thing was out of 



J AC A. 28l 

the question. Lodgings for four? Utterly out 
of the question it would be, were there but one 
in the party. 

This was satisfactory for four tired and hun- 
gry people, three or four_ thousand miles from 
their base, and very sleepy, in the gray of a 
Sunday morning. 

Was there perhaps any other Fonda? 

" Another Fonda ?" Clearly it was a miracle 
that there was one. 

" But evidently," said this writer, in that in- 
different dialect which has been before alluded 
to, " in a town as large as this there must be 
some comfortable lodgings for ladies who are 
tired. What matter if there be no other 
Fonda?" 

"What matter, indeed?" A brisk little man 
in a blue blouse, whom I shall long remember, 
had, in an instant, my carpet-bag, umbrella, 
shawls, great-coat, and rug, and I dare not say 
how many painting-blocks and travellers' easels, 
in his arms, and said that, if we would only go 
with him a few steps, the matter would be per- 
fectly easy. 

So we went, in the dead still of the narrow 
streets, perhaps a quarter of a mile ! 

How grewsome it all seemed ! Never a crow- 
ing cock was stirring. 

When we arrived at the friend's whose house 



282 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

he selected, with the greatest difficulty some 
one was waked. Blue-blouse disappears, we 
all standing in the narrow street. After five 
minutes blue-blouse returns, dejected. No lodg- 
ings ! 

But there is another house where they will 
certainly receive the senor and the senoras. 

Here a second act, — same scenery and same 
drop-scene. Similar denouement. But there 
was yet another house known to blue-blouse, 
and we should certainly succeed there. 

While blue-blouse goes in a third time, and 
wakes and pleads, and while we wait, the still- 
ness of the dawn is broken by a fife, and then by 
singing. In a moment more, five grave young 
men, dressed in white from head to foot, but 
with their clothes trimmed with black braid and 
other ornaments, came solemnly dancing, now 
backwards now forwards, swinging their casta- 
nets high above their heads, and keeping careful 
measure with the tune. 

As we saw afterwards, this was a religious 
ceremony. 

Blue-blouse reappears. He has wholly failed 
again. The excellent friends will not receive the 
travellers. At which this writer waxes indig- 
nant, and beats a retreat to the diligence, which, 
fortunately, has not gone. 

" What, ho there ! put these trunks on again. 



JACA. 283 

If there is no room for travellers in Jaca, we will 
go on to Panticosa." 

Now we did not want to go to Panticosa. In- 
deed, that was exactly what we had determined 
not to do. A vile, stuck-up watering-place, half 
French, half Spanish, for diseased people. This 
was our imagined picture of it. Was that what 
we had compassed sea and land to see, we who 
had no diseases? And we, who had so cleverly 
managed it that our diligence ride should be 
only eight hours, were we now to have six more 
rudely glued upon the end of the nine into which 
the eight were lengthened ? It was sad to think 
of! But, on the other hand, we could not sit on 
the stones at Jaca as if we had all been Murillo's 
beggars. 

Thus was it, that, in accents of fine rage, the 
chief said, " We will go to Panticosa." 

At this moment another blue-blouse stepped 
forward. I remember him, and shall, as if he 
were the angel Uriel. 

" They shall not go to Panticosa. They shall 
stay here, if they stay in my mothers house. " 
This to the populace. Then to the porters, 
" Leave those trunks where they are." Then to 
me : " Senor, you will observe that every one is 
very much engaged. This must be so, for all 
the passengers ask for their chocolate, and they 
must have it, as you see. But immediately the 



284 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

diligences will be away again, and the passen- 
gers. Do you and the ladies wait confidently. 
I assure you that some rooms shall be found for 
you, even if you stay at my own mother's.'' 

Was not that hospitality? Of course we did 
as we were bidden. We joined the chocolate 
party. We even saw them take their places on 
the diligence complacently and retire. At once 
the forces of Jaca were directed to the accom- 
modation of the four wayfarers; and before 
forty-eight hours were over, I think we had all 
voted Jaca to be the most hospitable place in the 
world. 

Gradually that appeared to our crass hebetude 
of northern dulness, which every one had sup- 
posed that we knew before ; viz., that this was 
the feast-day of Santa Osoria, and that half the 
province was already assembled in little Jaca, to 
assist in the grand ceremonies of the celebration. 
These young men whom we had seen dancing 
with castanets were to precede the silver casket 
which contains the relics of the saint. Jaca was 
crowded to its last corridor with friends and 
neighbors, visitors who had come to the festival. 
And upon that crowd we four innocents had 
sauntered in, and had asked for lodgings as if it 
were any common day. 

So soon as we came to our bearings, all things 
seemed simple, cordial, and easy. 



JACA. 285 

Curious it is, I have no recollection that 
blue-blouse No. 1 ever accosted me again, or 
that I ever heard of him again. In England 
certainly, and in America if he had been an 
Irishman, he would not have left me till he had 
secured a quarter-dollar for his good intentions. 
But though I should gladly have paid him in 
Jaca, I do not think that it occurred to him as a 
part of the transaction. Certainly blue-blouse 
No. 2, that brisk little man of affairs, never re- 
ceived any fee, and would not have permitted 
me to offer it. We were among self-respecting 
people, who, as we had come to Jaca, wanted us 
to think well of Jaca. Before I had done with 
Jaca, I surmised that its inhabitants did not 
think their home any less central than the in- 
habitants of the Hub of the Universe think 
theirs. 

Long sweet naps, a nice almuerzo, and the 
courteous Gregorio Mur, keeper of the Fonda, 
gives us notice that the religious service at the 
church is nearly over, and that the procession 
will soon move. If we would like to see it, a 
place will be ready for us on a balcony, where 
we can see it well. Accordingly he leads us 
through the dense crowd to the very best place 
in the city, where the residents most kindly 
place our party, in the very best seats, at the 
best balcony to witness the whole pageant. Gre- 



286 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

gorio Mur, be it observed, our kindly host and 
guide, reminds you in his aspect of Robert 
Collyer. 

We are directly opposite the quaint old cathe- 
dral ; the very oldest, I suppose, that we have 
seen. It was founded by Ramiro in 814, and 
is called by our dear Santa Osoria's name. The 
cathedral of three thousand people, capital of a 
province of perhaps thirty thousand, is not large. 
But this is very solemn, of grave, Romanesque 
architecture, and you walk through it with the 
satisfaction of feeling that it meets the wants 
and wishes to-day of the people who are here 
to-day. 

Already the chiefs of villages, bearing the 
banners of their churches, were filing out from 
the church, and taking their places in the little 
square ; for each church in the diocese is rep- 
resented here, perhaps forty in all. Perhaps 
some priest is present. Perhaps they have sent 
down a silver ark, which contains some sacred 
relic. Certainly there are two or four or more 
stalwart men, chosen from among the better 
farmers, or men of most mark in each village, 
and honored with the charge of the standard 
of the church. This standard is a handsome 
banner of silk, red, white, green, orange, or blue, 
embroidered with gold, and borne on a tall 
stout staff, at least twelve feet high. It is no 



J AC A. 287 

sinecure, the bearing such a standard. The 
bearers wear a uniform, which, seeing it there, 
you call a white surplice. If you saw it in Fan- 
euil Hall market, you would call it a butcher's 
frock. They are well aware of the dignity of 
their office, but stand talking and laughing while 
they wait for the bishop and other officials to 
appear. As I understood it, each banner was 
separately blessed within the cathedral, where, 
before this, a discourse had been pronounced 
commemorative of Santa Osoria. So they did 
not throng out tumultuously, but came out vil- 
lage by village. At last, all was over in the ca- 
thedral, and a large military band, with the garri- 
son in full uniform, moved as the escort to the 
ecclesiastical procession. The banner-bearers 
took up the line of march, and the people 
thronged along by their sides. 

June the 25th, time high noon, latitude about 
43 . Readers in this neighborhood may im- 
agine how nearly vertical was the sun, and how 
little shade the houses, not high, gave, when 
the streets ran nearly north or south. It was 
pretty, therefore, once and again, when a trunk 
of relics was borne along, supported by two 
stout staves on the shoulders of four stout men, 
to see how little children from the throng were 
permitted to walk in the sacred shade below. 
Indeed, there was, all along, a grateful recogni- 



288 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

tion of the family relation, and wives and daugh- 
ters joined the standard-bearers, and walked in 
the procession as well as they. 

At last came the great centre of attraction. 
Reverently, and with dignity, our dancing friends 
of the morning appeared, with their own musi- 
cians. And as David danced before the ark, 
when it was brought up in triumph from Philistia, 
so these five young Aragonese danced in tri- 
umph before the ark of Santa Osoria. Gener- 
ally they danced backward, by way of showing 
more honor to the saint. Their castanets beat 
time, and the brave fellows never seemed to flag 
in the hot hours of that long ceremonial. The 
ark itself was, I think, the largest and most ele- 
gant of all the arks. Eight men, I believe, bore 
it — four before, four behind — on two staves 
which ran through silver rings on the sides. It 
was of silver, of the shape of a very old-fashioned 
leather travelling-trunk. 

Santa Osoria, R. V. Y. M., was a Christian 
lady, a nun, I think, who fell into the hands of the 
Moors, and was beheaded by them, I believe ; 
but not until she had done many and great kind- 
nesses to the poor people of these valleys, who 
still hold her memory sacred. R. V. Y. M., as 
you may have guessed, means Real Virgen y 
Martir. 

Around the casket of the saint the crowd was 



JACA. 289 

denser than ever. Whoever could come near 
enough threw a scarf or handkerchief upon the 
silver, for a blessing. We had seen this done 
when the other arks had passed ; but this was 
the most sacred of all. 

The bishop and other ecclesiastical dignita- 
ries, in full costume, and the political governor 
with his military staff, in full uniform, made part 
of the gay and brilliant procession. At dif- 
ferent places in it there were three large and 
good military bands. 

So we saw it form and file off from the plaza, 
and when all had gone by, it was suggested that 
we should cross to another point and see it again 
on its return. Here we were again made wel- 
come at the convenient rooms of the club. For 
Jaca, though a city of only three thousand 
people, maintains its club, which maintains its 
reading-room. Here again, as foreigners, we 
had the best place given us at the best window, 
and again saw the pretty procession, and what 
every one considered the most interesting feat- 
ure, the solemn dance, as it passed by. 

From the club we crossed to the open space, 
which on another occasion would be the 
ground for a bull-fight, and here again were 
made welcome in the best balcony at the best 
point of view for the close of the ceremony. 

Directly in front of us, overlooking the great 
19 



290 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

square, was a lofty staging or platform, covered 
with a canopy or awning, and beautifully deco- 
rated. There were already assembled the bishop 
and a few of the principal clergy, still in their 
rich robes of ceremony. To the front of this 
open platform was brought the precious cas- 
ket which contained the relics of Santa Osoria. 
The procession arranged itself in groups around 
the square, and the dancing troop repeated, for the 
last time, their sacred performance before the 
casket. The people still pressed up, eager 
to have their scarfs and handkerchiefs conse- 
crated. The standard-bearers would drop the 
long poles of their banners and hold them low 
for a moment, so that the people might fix their 
handkerchiefs to them, and then they would lift 
up the staff so as to touch the casket, and, after 
the consecration, would restore the prizes to 
their owners. Meanwhile active priests, on the 
right and left hand of the casket, lowered little 
buckets with cords, and drew them up filled with 
handkerchiefs and scarfs, touched these to the 
caskets, and sent them down again. 

But all this ceased for the moment, when, after 
all the groups were in place, the bishop advanced 
to the casket and opened it. An officiating 
priest lifted out one of the elegant covers which 
protected the relics, a beautifully embroidered 
cloth of velvet or satin. This was displayed, 



JACA. 291 

and laid on one side. Then another and an- 
other were displayed, until thirty or forty of 
these beautiful coverings had been taken out 
and hung, one after another, upon the rail. 
Then came a moment of hushed silence ; every 
one in the great assembly fell on his knees and 
crossed himself, and the relic of the saint was 
lifted up and exhibited. What it was I do not 
know ; it was far too small to be discerned from 
the place where we were. 

At once there was a new rush forward with 
articles to be consecrated. I saw an enterpris- 
ing priest who touched to the relics two large 
bunches of printed sheets, which were, I suppose, 
lives of the saint, and were intended for circula- 
tion. When this was all done, a new silken 
covering was laid upon the relics, the others 
were placed in the casket again, and it was 
closed for another year. The procession took 
up its march on its return, and the solemnity 
was over. 

It was most interesting that through the whole 
day there was not one sign of discontent, dis- 
satisfaction, or faithlessness. No one laughed 
at the tossing of handkerchiefs, no one said an 
unkind word, or showed any impatience. These 
were a perfect two hours from the age of faith. 

We retired to a lunch and a siesta. As the 
afternoon closed, we walked out again. In the 



292 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

shady space on the side of the cathedral young 
men and women were waltzing, or dancing some 
sort of saraband, to the music of a modest 
little band. The streets and squares were alive 
with a spontaneous fair which had organized 
itself on the sidewalk. As the day passed away, 
we could see groups of peasants gathering, with 
the standard-poles fastened to their mules, and 
the women and children clustering together in 
their pretty costumes, to walk or to ride home. 
The holiday was over. 

We all agreed to make an early start the next 
morning, that the artists might work while the 
shadows were long and the air cool. We went 
out from the quaint old archway, where the sen- 
tinels now knew us to be peaceful townspeople, 
and a pretty sight it was to see the people strag- 
gling off for their day's work. The harvest of 
wheat in the fields round the barn was nearly 
ready to be cut. The picturesqueness of the 
quaint old town, built for its three thousand peo- 
ple, walled in by a wall, almost circular, — oh, 
so exactly like Jericho or Ai on the old picture- 
map of Palestine, — is something hard to describe 
to an American who has not travelled. Outside 
the walls the green, fresh country comes up, 
as the ocean comes to the sides of a ship ; and 
the town and the country mix as little as do the 
ship and the ocean. Close to the walls on the 



J AC A. 293 

outside is a promenade, and the walk round 
takes perhaps fifty minutes. Three or four gates 
give ingress and egress, and apparently at only 
one of these was the form of a sentry main- 
tained. But perhaps when I passed he was 
hidden. 

There is a fort and garrison just outside, where 
Spain maintains a small force, to watch this road 
to France. 

In this quaint old city of Jaca we were already 
high in the Pyrenees. South of us, flanking the 
very road by which we had come, was the bold 
and beautiful mountain of Oruel, around which 
cluster all sorts of legends and ballads. North- 
ward the range of the Pyrenees, with tempting 
gorges, piercing it here and there, makes a 
magnificent horizon. Around you is what 
appears to be a rich valley; certainly it is 
productive under this diligent Aragonese agri- 
culture. 

Jaca boasts the establishment of the first Par- 
liament in the world. To make good this claim, 
you must of course say that a Roman Senate 
was not a Parliament, and that a Saxon Wite- 
nagemote was not one. These people boast that 
the oldest Spanish fuero was theirs. Kfuero is 
a bill of rights ; a sort of Magna Charta was this 
fuero. I think the original parchment was pre- 
served until the French invasion of 1809. The 



294 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

French destroyed it, as they did thousands of 
other monuments of Spanish pride and history. 

This is hardly the place to enter into any 
statement of what these fueros were. For prac- 
tical purposes it is enough to say that in the his- 
tory of Aragon they played a part not dissimilar 
from that of the charters of the Dutch cities and 
provinces in the earlier history of Holland. So 
important were the fueros and similar constitu- 
tional provisions in different parts of Spain, that 
the Spanish monarchy before Charles V. must 
be regarded as a limited monarchy, in which the 
sovereigns were held in check by the provincial 
assemblies, generally called the Cortes. In Ara- 
gon there had grown out of this constitutional 
system one very curious result. There existed, 
quite independent of the king, another officer, 
called the justicia, whose business it was to 
determine whether the king did or did not over- 
step the barriers imposed on him by the fueros. 
It is to the authority of this justicia that allusion 
is made in that proud oath, taken by the old 
kings at Zaragoza, which I have quoted. So 
soon as the Inquisition was established it came 
into direct conflict with the fueros, and their 
abolition is directly due more to the bad offices 
of the Inquisition than to the personal efforts of 
Charles V. and his successors. 

In the days of King Ramiro, or of somebody 



J AC A. 295 

who reigned before him, there was a palace 
here, of which some of the splendors still re- 
main. How queer is the mix-up of this strange 
country everywhere. We went to an apothe- 
cary's shop, very much such a looking shop as 
I might find in the business street, say of Cran- 
berry Centre. We asked the " gentlemanly pro- 
prietor " if we could see the celebrated fireplace 
of the palace. He was all courtesy and atten- 
tion, led us into the back of his shop, where 
were stored the boxes and demijohns from which 
the retail trade was supplied, then through a 
storeroom for hay and oats, and then into the 
half sitting-room, half kitchen, where his wife sat 
knitting and a little girl was playing with a cat. 
A fine large room, with a rough stone floor. 
There is not in New England a floor in a dwell- 
ing-house so uncomfortable. There is not in 
America a fireplace as magnificent as the carved- 
oak fireplace which we had come to see, nor a 
ceiling as grand as the oaken ceiling above us. 
The room, in short, was one of the state apart- 
ments of some Gothic king who reigned here 
perhaps twelve hundred years ago. The proud 
Aragonese, who keeps the apothecary's shop, 
had been, he said, approached by agents from 
the Cluny Museum in Paris, who wanted to buy 
his treasure for that collection. But Aragon 
will not sell its wonders to France. 



296 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The room is shorn of part of its former size. 
Under a ceiling, just as magnificent, is now a 
storehouse for oats and straw. 

As the cant of criticism sometimes teaches us 
that the Goths had nothing to do with Gothic 
architecture, the Gothic ornamentation of this 
remarkable fireplace is worth noting in passing. 
I did not measure it. But on the right and left, 
inside the space for the fire, eight or ten men 
would have sat easily. The whole structure 
occupied almost all of one side of a room thirty 
or forty feet square. 

He is a bold man who advises any one else 
where to spend a holiday. One man's fish is 
another man's poisson, and what pleased you 
most is the very thing which will distress Richard 
or Fanny. There is therefore a risk in saying 
that a hotel is good or a prospect fine, if be- 
cause you say so Richard goes there, and is put 
in a room you never saw at the hotel, and has to 
look out upon a pigpen. I will not therefore 
advise any one else to go to my dear Jaca, of 
which I feel as if I were the discoverer, or the 
re-discoverer, after Marcus Porcius Cato as afore- 
said. But I will say that we were all sorry that, 
instead of two days there, we could not stay two 
weeks. I do not believe that these would ex- 
haust the possible excursions and lines of his- 
torical study. 



J AC A. 297 

Does the reader perhaps remember that there 
was some doubt how we might leave Jaca? 
whether, indeed, we might not have to return 
rather than have the trunks slide off the mules' 
backs ? 

Let such doubts vanish, reader. At the table 
d'hote we met four French officers who had 
come over from the French garrison, some 
twenty or thirty miles away. They had come to 
try the new road, and it was perfect. Perhaps 
they implied that the Spanish part was not as 
good as the French, but it was all as good as 
need be. Sure enough, some spirit of prophecy 
had goaded us hither. The National Road, 
begun under Napoleon I.'s order in 1808, and 
keeping along by slow manoeuvres ever since, 
had been finished ten days before we came. 
A new carriage for travellers was waiting for 
us, and we were to be the first northward-bound 
tourists. 

I have often travelled in America with friends 
who wanted to start at five o'clock in the morn- 
ing. I cannot say that I ever wanted to. The 
result, unless indeed a railway were concerned, 
has been invariably the same. I have been on 
the spot, ready to start, at five. Sooner or later 
the other members of the party appeared. Last 
of all came the person who had proposed we 
should move early. Then the horses came to 



298 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

the door. Then the early starter discovered 
that his trunk needed a key or his boot a lacing. 
All parties stopped till this difficulty could be 
remedied. And finally, about seven or later, we 
got under way, with the feeling, which had bet- 
ter never be expressed, that we might all have 
stayed happily in bed. 

But in Spain five o'clock means five o'clock. 
Deeply ingrained into the habits of men's lives 
is the great truth that a siesta of three hours or 
more in the middle of the day will make good 
any loss of sleep in the morning. So, even in the 
land of postponement, men still rise early and 
promptly. And on the day of our farewell to 
Spain, breakfast was well finished, and the last 
hand-bag or alforca well in the little travelling- 
carriage, before half-past five, the hour fixed for 
departure in a caucus held for considering that 
subject the night before. 

This travelling-carriage deserves a word. Sim- 
ply, it was a little omnibus, big enough for 
four persons, to which you attached as many 
mules as occasion required, For our purposes 
we carried a driver and a postilion. The car- 
riage was wholly new, built for this service. I 
think it had crossed the pass but once each way 
before. In a dim way, the good woman who 
owned it and the post-house at Jaca seemed to 
know that considerable travel would cross the 



J AC A. 299 

mountains by this new road. As it is, in fact, 
the only available road for wheel carriages from 
one end of the range of Pyrenees to the other, 
as Pau, with all its lazy tourist population, is 
just north of Jaca, and not sixty miles away as 
the bird flies, I cannot doubt that a large mass 
of travel will pour down over the new road, and 
will pass another tide flowing the other way. 
The road is as good as the roads across the 
Swiss passes. The Spanish part maintains the 
old-time fame of the Spanish engineers. The 
French part was well planned. When we passed, 
it was not in as good order as the Spanish ; but 
the working parties were then engaged in the 
repairs, and the French administration is so 
good that no traveller need fear discomfort. 

We rode out of dear little Jaca by the gate 
close by our fonda, with the good wishes of our 
good Gregorio Mur, and of the same crowd who 
had so cordially welcomed us on Sunday morn- 
ing. Just outside is a complete little fort, built 
to defend the pass against invasion from France, 
— just such a fort as you read about as holding 
one of the Italian passes against Bonaparte's 
whole army. Even in peace it is garrisoned 
by a few companies, which we had seen in the 
procession of Sunday. We had been cordially 
welcomed there on a visit on Monday. A pic- 
turesque, pretty place it is, with wonderful pros- 



300 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

pects from its bastions. Of all Jaca, indeed, if 
I have given any idea of the quaint old city, the 
reader will readily imagine the charm for the 
artists of our party. You are surrounded with 
mountains, you are walled in by crenellated 
walls, you are defended by a fort in Vauban's 
second or his last method, with bona fide draw- 
bridge, moat, and portcullis, and every human 
being you meet could be put into the chorus of 
Don Giovanni in the opera, so picturesque is 
the costume. Throw in kind hosts and good 
enough fare, and what more can heart require? 

As one ought to expect at the advance guard 
of Spain, the regular hours were more Spanish 
than ever in Jaca. Almnerzo, or breakfast, was 
at one in the afternoon, and dinner at nine at 
night. I survived Monday by sharing the name- 
less meals of the diligence companies at and 
soon after sunrise. I had then only to call al- 
mnerzo dinner, and to call dinner supper, and 
I adjusted things to a New England basis. 

The road, like all such roads, clings to the side 
of a little mountain river, and with every half- 
hour or so we came to one of the little villa 
which we had seen represented in the pageant 
of Sunday. Always a picturesque church, 
sometimes a little narrow street of hou 
crowded closely together. All houses are of 
stone, timber being among the most precious 



JACA. 301 

commodities. Why people should live here it 
is hard to tell. But so it is hard to tell why 
they live in Pelham or Prescott, why they live 
in the valley of Sawyer's River or in the Pink- 
ham Notch. But any of us who have ever lived 
in these places are loud in declaring that there 
are good reasons for living there. I am sure 
that any of my friends who like as much as I do 
to spend a month at Greely's, at Waterville in 
New Hampshire, would join me in saying that 
the reasons for living in such places need not 
be explained to those who understand them 
already, and cannot be explained to those who 
do not. 

The same wealth of wild-flowers appears in 
the pass as gives glory and beauty to the Swiss 
valleys. We made out many of the same flow- 
ers which we knew in Switzerland. Often one 
is tempted to go on foot, perhaps by the old 
smuggling mule-track, across the neck of a long 
zigzag around which the carriage is winding. 
From such a foray you always returned to your 
seat with a new bouquet of flowers. The south- 
ern slope of the Pyrenees is very steep, almost 
precipitous in places. Often you cannot guess 
where the road will pierce the range. 

Four hours or less of rapid climbing in this 
most charming way brought us easily to Can- 
franc, the most northerly hamlet in Spain on 



302 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

this route. "Canes Franci" these excellent 
people were called in old times, — " French 
dogs ; " and hence their present name. " A nest 
of smugglers/' says our friend Murray; and 
such, perhaps, they are. The rewards of free 
trade may be among the reasons for wintering 
in the valley. I do not know; and I will not 
bear doubtful witness about my neighbor. " See 
well to the provant," says the same authority. 
But for this I had been negligent, and never 
did people exert themselves more promptly 
than did the authorities of the little Fonda to 
provide for guests, wholly unexpected as we 
were. Prompt they were, and successful. 

Forty houses, more or less, crowded together 
in one narrow street make the little town. A 
quaint, queer tower, as old as Philip the Second's 
time, the ruins of an older castle, a little church 
on one side of a little plaza, all cry aloud for the 
camera or sketch-book. But in our case the 
vistas of the river valley, as you look up or as 
you look down, with the precipices almost 
vertical beetling above them, claimed every 
moment that we could give to fine art. 

After two hours spent in drawing and at 
breakfast we were again upon our way. The 
mules we take this time must carry us to Urdos, 
which is the town corresponding to Canfranc on 
the French side of the mountains. Up and up 



J AC A. 303 

by zigzags steeper than ever, and now beyond 
the scattered cedars and firs which had clung to 
the cliffs in places further down. The flowers 
are now fairly Alpine, and every vacant place on 
the seats of the carriage is heaped with them. 
Higher and higher ! Some walking across by 
the pedestrians, as the zigzags grow steeper; 
and at last the good-natured driver, who is 
delighted at our enthusiasm, draws up a little 
unexpectedly, and cries, Somport. Somftort, you 
see, means summa porta, the highest gate. We 
are at the top of the pass, and the place is called 
by the same name which Marcus Porcius Cato 
called it by when he came over, two thousand 
and seventy years ago. 

A monument of stone a little demolished by 
frost, as if it were a monument in honor of Mr. 
Champernoun in some churchyard in Massachu- 
setts, has a tablet which told the history of our 
debt to the two Napoleons. It seems that this 
road was ordered as an imperial road by a de- 
cree of the first Napoleon on the twenty-second 
of July, 1808. The inscription calls it the Impe- 
rial Road, number 134. It was continued by 
the third Napoleon. The same inscription says, 
" On the fourteenth of July, 1861 — finished — " 
and here a blank. I suppose that in 1808 Na- 
poleon may have expected that his brother, 
the King of Spain, would build his half. But 



304 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

things have not moved on exactly in that line, 
and it has been left for the young Alphonso to 
finish it in this year, 1882, for the special ac- 
commodation, as I have said, of our enterprising 
party. 

Just above the monument was a growth of 
Alpen Rosen, the first that we had seen. It was 
nine years before, I think on the fourth of July, 
that I had gathered the first I ever saw in blos- 
som at a place strangely like this on the pass of 
the Simplon. 

Resting their mules by the monument were 
some Spanish muleteers, whose load was several 
bags of Spanish wine, from which they regaled 
our drivers, who were as thirsty as people of 
their profession are wont to be. The export of 
Spanish wines into France is larger with every 
year, and has been increased, I believe, since 
the ravages of the Phylloxera. The guide-books 
and other superficial critics say that if mofe 
care were taken, the rough Spanish vin du pays 
might be much better than it is. But for me, I 
take such criticisms with a good deal of caution. 
I think the people on the ground are apt to 
understand their own business better than trav- 
ellers do. As I have already intimated, I think 
the Spanish farmer is as industrious a farmer as 
can be found. And I do not believe that a peo- 
ple who know how to make sherry need much 



JACA. 305 

instruction from strangers as to the use of their 
grapes or their wine-presses. A few weeks after 
we passed Somport I saw that the London 
shops announced this Spanish country wine for 
sale at very low prices. It seems always to be 
called Val de Penas. But it is not really the 
product of any one valley. It is the color of Bur- 
gundy, very rough, very sour, and very strong. 

The Pyrenees are called Pyrenees now, and 
apparently have been so called ever since the 
creation of the world and the first making of 
maps. The Greeks and Romans so called them, 
with reasonable variations in the spelling. The 
Phoenicians apparently visited the Pyrenees as 
well as every other spot in Europe the name of 
which may be derived from the Hebrew. These 
roving voyagers, they say, seeing the country to 
be covered with forests, called the whole place 
Purani, after a word in their own language which 
meant wood. The Phoenicians were the North- 
men of the Old World, and there are few places 
in Europe which do not bear the marks of their 
passion for nomenclature. The student of the 
Greek Reader fifty years ago will remember 
that Strabo, or whoever furnished the simple 
Greek geography for that volume, derived the 
name from the Greek word pur, which lingers in 
our fire, and referred it to the destructive fires 
which then, as now, often wasted the forests. 

20 



306 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

The whole passage is curious enough in the 
light of modern geography, as showing what 
Strabo did, and what he did not, know. Observe, 
loyal reader, that Strabo lived in the reign of 
Augustus, and was certainly writing as late as 
the eighteenth year of our era. He says : — 

"The Pyrenean mountains excel all other 
mountains in their height and in their age. 
There are many forests upon them, and it is 
said that in old times the whole mountain 
region was entirely burnt over by some shep- 
herds, who were careless of their fire, and it is 
said that by the fire raging continuously for 
many days all the surface of the soil was burnt 
off, and the mountains were called Pyrenees 
[from pur, the Greek word for fire], from that 
which had happened. And it is said that the 
surface of the region burned flowed with a great 
deal of silver, and that thus were produced many 
streams of pure silver. And it is said that be- 
cause the natives were ignorant of the value of 
this silver the Phoenician traders, hearing of 
what had happened, bought the silver for very 
trifling returns of other merchandise. And thus 
these Phoenicians made great profits." 

Diodorus Siculus says that when the Phoeni- 
cians had loaded their ships with silver, they made 
silver anchors and left the iron ones. But in our 
days the silver of Spain is found in the south. 



J AC A. 307 

If we are fond of home production, however, 
we may believe that there was once a lovely 
maid here whose name was Pyrene, or something 
sounding very like it, around whom enough 
romance clustered to make it perfectly reason- 
able and appropriate to name after her this great 
mountain chain; for the Pyrenees are a part 
of the great mountain chain which, extending 
from one end of Asia to the other end of Eu- 
rope, forms a sort of axis for history to revolve 
upon. 

This great mountain system runs into the 
Atlantic Ocean, and the Pyrenees are the most 
western branch. They are not among the high- 
est mountains in the world. Their highest peaks 
are, I believe, somewhere about 1 1,000 feet above 
the sea level. At Somport my little pocket 
barometer read, I think, 9,300 feet. But they 
penetrate Spain and Southern France with their 
spurs, and they were as good as they could be in 
the Middle Ages, when they became very con- 
venient resting-places for the robber-barons who 
infested that period of history. At present, 
however, the robber- barons are dead, and their 
descendants, if there be any, are kept well in 
hand, so that travelling is comparatively safe. 
The castles of these middle-aged worthies are, 
however, left in a state of preservation quite suf- 
ficient for the picturesque. Besides this, the 



303 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

mountains are in themselves beautiful, and 
would be more so if the inhabitants had not a 
heathen fashion of cutting down the magnificent 
forests which once covered the mountains even 
more than they do at present. For the hunts- 
man and the angler they are delightful, because 
unvisited. The forests and the mountains have 
much game, and the streams are filled with 
salmon and trout. With these, however, we did 
not meddle, save as they presented themselves 
at breakfast, dinner, and supper. 

And now we are in France. And the con- 
trast is as sharp as is between a salt-marsh 
and an oak-island upon it. Almost on the 
moment we are shaded by hemlocks and firs, 
and we dash like fury downhill over a road 
which makes one think he is in the White 
Mountains. I have never seen a mountain 
region where the evergreen growth was so 
high, yet I have been higher than Somport is, 
in Switzerland and in the Rocky Mountains. 
The Spanish side of the range is a series of bare 
precipitous cliffs; the French side is of com- 
paratively gentle slopes, clothed almost to the 
top with this magnificent green forest. No one 
has explained this to me, and I can only guess 
at a reason. 

My guess is this, that the south winds which 
have crossed Spain bring very little moisture, 



J AC A. 309 

because the country is arid and the sea far away. 
But any north or northwest winds would pass 
over France, which is not a dry country, or over 
the Bay of Biscay, which is not near a hundred 
miles from Samport as the bird flies. Passing 
south or north the winds would leave such mois- 
ture as they had upon the mountain ranges, and 
they would leave it on the north or south side, 
whichever they might strike first. I am dis- 
posed also to think that the extreme heat of a 
southern sun on the precipitous cliffs of the 
southern side of the Pyrenees would in itself 
arrest vegetation at the only season for vegeta- 
tion. It certainly would prevent much conden- 
sation of vapor on that slope during at least 
half the year. 

Now, vegetation depends on moisture as well 
as heat. The southern side of the range seemed 
to me burned dry, not by these fires of which 
Strabo speaks, but by the southern sun of sum- 
mer. If at the same time there were moist 
winds and many clouds and much rain, here 
would be tropical luxury. Failing moisture, 
there is a burned look on the south side, and 
not a palm nor an agave. 

I could not but compare this arid aspect of 
what I have called the southern slope, which is 
a slope so steep that it is almost a precipice, 
with the rich vegetation of Isola Bella in Lago 



3IO SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

Maggiore, after one has crossed the Simplon. 
To be sure, you have many miles of distance 
there, between the beautiful island and the Alps. 
The moisture of the lake and the neighborhood 
of the seas supply in Italy just what is wanting 
in Spain for such luxurious vegetation. 

I wish some one who knows about ranges of 
mountains running east and west in other coun- 
tries, as in Hungary or in India, would tell me 
whether there is greater richness of forest vege- 
tation on the northern slope than there is on the 
southern. It certainly is so on the Pyrenees. 

The little French omnibus we took at Urdos 
differed not materially from the Spanish coche 
we had left, but we missed our friendly driver; 
the new one had no personal interest in us, and 
there were other passengers to share his atten- 
tions. It was hard to shake off our Spanish pref- 
erences and become French upon the spot. 

But everything had turned into French : the 
language, the money, the manners of the people. 
The Alpine nature of the scenery gave place to 
thick midsummer verdure ; there were no more 
Alpen Rosen ; great spikes of foxglove and snap- 
dragon showed themselves. The hedges were 
draped with clematis, and the roadside, in fact, 
looked like any New England one in July, 
heaped with dust, but thick with leaves and 
blossoms. 



JACA. 311 

The road runs through the so-called Valine 
d'Aspe, which is Basque, and means simply, low, 
shut-in country. It was in old times a little re- 
public, respected by its suzerains, the princes of 
Beam, who promised early to allow to the inhab- 
itants their liberty of their own customs. Even 
after Beam was joined to the crown of France, 
these liberties were respected. 

Just after leaving Urdos we crossed a bridge, 
and then all our heads were stretched from the 
windows and door of our little omnibus, to see 
the oddly constructed portalet or fort of Urdos. 
In a narrow defile, upon a huge rock, two or 
three hundred feet high, rise walls which seem 
to be a part of the mountain. A bridge with one 
arch connects the road with the base of the rock, 
which is ascended by zigzag steps cut in it, to 
the fortress, placed on the very edge of the per- 
pendicular precipice. The wall is pierced with 
casemates, and the effect is as if the natural rock 
had been scooped out to construct the interior. 
The bridge we crossed could be easily removed, 
and then the pass would be wholly impractica- 
ble, the guns of the fort controlling it. It was 
finished only in 1848, after ten years' work. 
Thus the French, while they have exerted 
themselves to overcome the natural barrier, the 
Pyrenees, between their country and Spain, by 
building good roads, have not failed to take 



312 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

precautions to secure themselves in time of 
invasion. 

Sometimes the walls of the valley shut in upon 
us ; occasionally they opened to show glimpses 
of snow-capped mountain-tops, well called pics, 
as almost all of them are, for they are pointed, 
like inverted icicles. 

At Bedous we stopped a while to change 
horses, which were mules, as usual ; and to 
change our positions we alighted and went into 
the little wayside inn, no longer a posada, and 
found our fonda replaced by a buffet. It was a 
delightful, rambling old house. The large room 
on the left was a kitchen, with a huge fireplace 
on one side, where a few sticks only were smoul- 
dering in the sunny summer afternoon. A cat 
and her family of kittens were grouping them- 
selves about the hearth ; two were comfortably 
resting in a saucepan on the dresser. 

The landlady invited us to walk in her garden, 
a large, rambling place, full of all manner of 
old-fashioned flowers, running wild, without 
much attention from the hand of the gardener. 
Her pretty maid, with head tied up in a kerchief 
we must no longer call a panuela, gathered 
great bunches of flowers for the ladies, among 
them a great hypericum with yellow blossoms 
an inch and a half across, otherwise just like our 
little St. Johnswort, so common in the fields, 



JACA. 313 

"punctate with transparent dots." In spite, or 
perhaps on account, of the saucepan-full of 
kittens, the place seemed like a pleasant rest- 
ing-place, and some of the party really dreamed 
of returning to stay a month. We went up to 
look at the bedrooms ; they were low, but neat 
and attractive, opening upon a long piazza 
which overlooked the gay garden. The land- 
lady was eloquent, in hopes we would come 
back. But, alas ! none of us ever saw Bedous 
any more. 

The way was almost level now, and the river, 
when we saw it, moved tranquilly along with no 
more brawling. Our spirits were falling, also, a 
little ; for the day had been long and everybody 
was tired. We kept ourselves up by wondering 
what kind of place Oleron might be, and also 
how we were to connect with the rest of the 
world on leaving it; for our Spanish guide- 
books abandoned us at the frontier, and we were 
not yet armed with a Guide Joanne. 

The sun had set, and lights began to shine as 
we rattled into town on pavements which alone 
showed us that we were approaching a large 
city. A youth sprang upon the step of an om- 
nibus as we turned a corner into a wide street, 
and, thirsty for information, we ventured to ask 
him, " Is it true that there is a chemin de fer at 
Oleron?" 






314 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

"Oh, certainly/' he replied, and that there 
would be a train that evening for Pau. 

It was not worth while lying awake about, es- 
pecially as we were so tired ; but we wondered 
then, and have often wondered since, what was 
the meaning of that French youth. There is no 
railroad from Oloron anywhere, nor was there 
any means of leaving it that night. 

However, there was an excellent hotel, of the 
kind that ceases to be when railways begin ; a 
courtyard which was the home of diligences ; in 
the house friendly people and neat maids, who 
would talk either Spanish or French. 

There will be a railroad some day from Pau to 
Oloron, a part of the route which will make 
communication between Paris and Madrid more 
direct than at present. The road on which we 
came, pushed further at each end, will leave 
only a short distance to be crossed by diligence. 
To this Oloron looks forward for its future great- 
ness ; at present it is a prosperous town of eight 
thousand inhabitants, whose chief industry is 
making the woollen sashes and caps everybody 
wears in that part of the world. 

Oloron has the reputation of stanch Catholi- 
cism. When Jeanne d'Albret sent them a Prot- 
estant minister, the people rose with such fury 
that he and his companions " had enough to do 
to save themselves/' says the chronicle. 



JACA. 315 

The next morning, having assured ourselves, 
in all the languages we could command, that 
" the boy lied/' and that there was no railroad, 
we found ourselves in our own open carriage, 
bag and baggage behind, rolling along a broad 
smooth road to Pau. 

It was a drive of five hours, through pretty- 
suburban country, the road lined with villas and 
chateaux, nearer and nearer together as the 
great watering-place is approached. The Pyre- 
nees were receding from us ; our favorite Pic du 
Midi d'Ossau, which had closed the vista behind 
us all the day before, showed himself less and 
less often; for Pau is miles away from the 
mountain chain, its claim to which is only 
through the distant view of it, very beautiful, to 
be seen from its broad terraces overhanging the 
river. 

Let no one, therefore, visit Pau with the idea 
of penetrating the heart of the Pyrenees; for 
that he must go further on, to Pierrefitte or 
Luchon, where railways leave him ; and to the 
wonderful amphitheatre of Gavarnie, with its 
lofty waterfall ; or pause content at pretty little 
Luz, nestled down in its little three-cornered 
valley, bristling with poplars. 

Pau is as far from the Pyrenees as Berne is 
from the range of the Jungfrau ; but the view is 
as wide as the celebrated one from the terrace 



316 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

at Berne, and in some respects it is similar. 
Across the wide valley the blue shapes of the 
mountains stretch like a line of smoke ; the lower 
hills are covered with green, and the river Gave 
runs sparkling between them. It is the climate 
of Pau which attracts people. In winter it is 
crowded with invalids and strangers. When we 
were there it was la saison morte ; the streets 
looked like Saratoga in October and Newport in 
March. All the villas were a louer, with closed 
blinds and neglected gravel-walks; there were 
plenty of rooms to be had at the hotels. The 
view, however, was there; and the gay winter 
world must miss something of the midsummer 
beauty which lay over the shining valley as we 
saw it. 

The chateau of Henry IV. was also to be 
seen, to the deep interest of the young histo- 
rian of our party, who viewed with emotion 
the tortoise-shell cradle in which her favorite 
monarch was rocked. It is the whole upper 
shell of a huge turtle. The castle is full of 
really interesting relics; there are the Gobelin 
tapestries of scenes in the life of Henry, as fresh 
in color as oil-paintings . of to-day ; the view 
from the windows which overhang the river is 
the same as that from the terrace of the pano- 
rama of the Pyrenees. 

All these things we saw, but with somewhat 



JACA. 317 

listless eyes, for we had not yet shaken off the 
impression of Spanish scenes. Henry IV. was 
not to us the hero who filled our imaginations, 
still employed with Boabdil and the ultimo sos- 
piro del Moro. Our ultimo sospiro, up at Can- 
franc, where we crossed the frontier, was too 
recent for us to interest ourselves deeply in the 
cradle of the Bourbon kings. 

And so, dear reader, it is time for us to bid 
each other good-by, with all thanks on my part 
for the loyalty with which you have held to us 
in good report and in evil. What banditti we 
have escaped we shall probably never know. 
Whether we might have gone by better routes, 
who can tell till he has tried them? Possibly, 
indeed, our whole theory of travel is wrong. 
Quien sabe ? as we will say for the last time. 
This is certain, it is not wholly wrong. However 
it may be with the reader, I know four people 
who do not think the journey could be improved 
upon. They think that they never expended 
seven weeks of time, and the proportion of 
money belonging to it, to better purpose. 

Before we fairly shake hands and say the last 
word, let us see if we can answer some of the 
questions with which we began. First, as to that 
doubtful matter of language. Believe me, we 
enjoyed more, learned more, and saw more, be- 
cause we had no interpreter. At the end of two 



318 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

or three weeks we found we were listening to 
preachers, to other public speakers, with a rea- 
sonable understanding of what they were aiming 
at, and, by the time our journey was over, I 
found I could join quite bravely in the conversa- 
tion of a table d'hote. This we owe to Mr. Pren- 
dergast and his " Mastery system." I do not 
say, after six months, that one does not forget 
the language as readily as he learned it ; but I 
think I should very soon come to my bearings 
again if I were in the West Indies or in Spain. 

Second, as to that matter of climate. Must 
a person give up Spain because he cannot go 
there in winter? 

This is certain, that the Spaniards themselves 
live there all the year round. They would be 
very much surprised to be told that their coun- 
try was uninhabitable in June, July, or August. 
It is also certain that the railway trains run at 
all parts of the year. The people who carry on 
that business would be surprised if you told 
them that travel was impossible. 

As the reader has seen, we did our best to fall 
in with the habits of the country. Among those 
habits, foremost, I might say, is the determina- 
tion not to go abroad in summer in the four hot 
hours, between eleven and three. If possible, a 
Spaniard would extend those hours. In travel- 
ling, it is not always possible to keep up this 



J AC A. 319 

determination. And in Spain, as in all other 
countries, a railway carriage, between two and 
four in the afternoon, is about the hottest place 
you can find, unless you be in the business of 
rolling iron. 

But it will generally be in your power to avoid 
travelling in the siesta hours. For instance, we 
crossed from Granada to Jaen before one, and 
at four, or thereabouts, resumed our journey. 
So we crossed from Zaragoza to Huesca before 
ten, and at six resumed our journey. The peo- 
ple of the country do not like to travel in the 
heat more than this estimable reader does, and 
they arrange for their convenience in preparing 
their schedules quite as much as they do for his. 
As I said in an early chapter, there is apt to be 
only more night travel than one likes offered 
to him. And one does not suffer from heat in 
travelling at night. 

The reader, of course, will observe that the 
high sierras of the south and the Pyrenees on 
the north offer the same summer advantages to 
tourists, or people seeking rest, which mountain 
ranges always offer. 

About summer travelling, one general remark 
is to be made to Americans. Our notions about 
it are not the same as those of the English trav- 
ellers who make most of the European guide- 
books. President Felton said to me, some 



320 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

twenty years ago, that he had always found sum- 
mer the best time to travel, even in the south of 
Europe. He spoke particularly of Greece, where 
he was quite at home. Of course you must be 
careful, you must choose your time. But you 
have the great advantage of the long days. And 
when your business as well as your pleasure is 
to see things, it is certainly well to have daylight 
in which you can see, and to have as much of it 
as is possible. My verdict, after seven weeks of 
May and June, would be the same. 

So, I think, would be that of most Americans, 
not unused to hot summers at home. We should 
not hesitate to take June, or even July or Au- 
gust, for a journey through the mountain parts 
of Virginia, or to go to the caves of Kentucky. 
We should expect to be careful at mid-day. But 
we should know that long and delightful morn- 
ings and afternoons would be our compensatioa 

And now comes the question which every- 
body puts to me, the political question : " Will 
they pull through?" I think we are all in- 
terested in the reply to this. We hate the 
Spaniard, in a certain sense, as Drake and 
Hawkins and Amyas Leigh hated him. But 
this only means that we hate Charles V. and 
Philip II., — that we hate lying and treachery, 
the Inquisition and its iniquities. We love Co- 
lumbus. We are personally grateful to him, 



JACA. 321 

every man, woman, and child in America, because 
we were born where we were born, which we 
owe to him. And, after travel in Spain, at best 
one comes to our Isabella the Good. Were 
we beginning to take an interest in Mexico, 
where dear old Judge Sewall thought the ter- 
restrial paradise was, we cannot but see how 
much we owe to Spain. We see how every 
traveller is fascinated with the country. And so 
every one asks me, "Will they pull through ?" 

Well, I am no prophet. Sometimes I wish 
I were, and then again I am glad I am not. 
I observe that people never believe true prophets 
in their time; they generally stone them. On 
the other hand, there is the highest authority for 
turning a cold shoulder on false ones. Into the 
business of prediction I go not, though it is often 
my pleasure to do my best in other lines of 
prophecy. This is certain, that you cannot help 
hoping much from a people so industrious as 
the Spaniards, and so temperate. The master 
evil of drinking, which is the worst evil England 
has to meet, is not their evil in Spain. Charles 
V. laughed at them because they were drinking 
all the time. But they had the wit to drink 
sugared water. 

On the other hand, you cannot hope much 
from a people who are well sick of their religion. 
And I am afraid the Spaniards are. Yet Buckle 



322 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

and the rest say they are a superstitious people. 
If I judged from what I saw in our dear little 
Jaca, I should say that there was implicit and 
reverent faith; and I could sympathize with 
the Ultramontanists, who beg me to let it alone. 
But I must not judge from Jaca. I must judge 
from Madrid and Seville and Granada. And 
I am afraid that they are sadly in need of some 
sort of Wesley or Moody or George Fox to give 
them a sense of the real intimacy of God with 
man. In my notion, some layman will do this 
business for them better than can any man who 
has passed through the grinding oppression of 
the Catholic priesthood, and is so far disabled 
from speaking, man-fashion, to his fellow-men. 

I have spoken rather lightly of their politics. 
But here, as I owned, I have little more than 
that superficial knowledge, very nearly worth- 
less, which any man has who reads newspapers 
alone. I had no good chance to sit down and 
talk with any of their own men of affairs about 
the real state of the country. The foreign mer- 
chants, whom I did see a good deal, are, I think, 
in any country, the last men to give you a true 
idea of its affairs. 

They are still in the era of talk. It is indeed 
a pity, to repeat a fine phrase, that " their lan- 
guage lends itself to oratory." The trouble with 
the Irish people is that their language lends 



JACA. 323 

itself to oratory, and their leaders cannot lead 
them to any purpose, because they give up to 
blatherskite what was meant for mankind. Be- 
hind all this talk in Spain there is certainly 
much work done. The post-office is bad. Per- 
haps all travellers say that of all post-offices. 
But of other administration, the figures I have 
already cited tell a not unfavorable story. And, 
as I am constantly saying, industry and temper- 
ance in the rank and file must tell. 

Do not let us be deceived by mere Madrid 
politics. That would be the same mistake which 
all Englishmen make about America. They 
suppose Washington is an American London. 
They suppose that we are as much excited about 
a change in the cabinet as they would be if Mr. 
Gladstone's cabinet changed. Now, we are not. 
Even the " twopenny shrieker," anxious to sell 
to-day's paper, cannot pretend to that interest. 
We are interested in home affairs. Just so with 
Spain. Remember, that is a federate kingdom 
still. All the centralization of four bad centu- 
ries has not broken up the love of home and 
home affairs. There is no such procession of 
magnates with their families to any " season " at 
the capital, as you see in England. There is 
no pretence that Madrid is Spain, as men say 
that Paris is France. I am apt to think that 
the creation of Madrid was a mistake from the 



324 SEVEN SPANISH CITIES. 

beginning. But whether that be so or not, the 
existence of Madrid does not destroy vigorous 
life in the provinces; and, by a very sensible 
system, much of their local administration is re- 
ferred to local authorities. 

A man might fancy at Madrid that all Spain 
was given up to office-hunting. So a man might 
say of America at Washington. But America is 
not given up to office-hunting, and I hope Spain 
will not prove to be. 

I met men of energy and sense who were hard 
at work on the problems of education. A long 
and hard future is before them. But I would 
ask for no better future than those Spanish 
boys. Give them, what the church has not 
given them, teachers who want to have them 
think, who do not mean to do their thinking 
for them, and they will have a better chance 
than their fathers. And so will Spain have a 
better chance than she has had. You and I, 
dear reader, do not think the worse of her 
people because they call each other cabal- 
lero y and because they can do a favor without 
expecting a fee. And certainly there is hope 
for a people of whose country even the grumb- 
ling English guide-books confess that a woman 
may travel alone in any part of Spain, and shall 
not anywhere be in any danger of insult. 



INDEX. 



Abdurrhaman, 50. 

Abyla, 86. 

Academy of Fine Arts, 236.- 

Academy of History, 161. 

Administration, 182. 

Admiral Fox, 117. 

Africa, 84. 

Agricultural Society, 187. 

Aix, 20. 

Alcala* de Hendres, 240. 

Alcantara, Doctor of, 241. 

Alcazars, 40, 42, 53, 56, 154. 

Algeciras, 84. 

Alhama, 92, 233. 

Alhambra, 61, 93, 114. 

Almuerzo, 88. 

Alonzo Cano, 67, 222. 

Amadis of Gaul, 89. 

Americanists, Congress of, 163. 

Amicis's Italy, 48, 211. 

Arabian Nights, 53. 

Aragon, 256. 

Aranjuez, 209. 

Archbishop Turpin, 17. 

Armory of Madrid, 218. 

Army expenses, 173. 

Arroz a la Valenciana, 114. 

Art School in Seville, 67. 

Atrium, 150, 210. 

Bad Queen, the, 182. 
Baetis, the, 45. 
Baeza, 148. 
Barcelona, 268. 



Basques, 28. 

Bayonne, 20. 

Bedous, 312. 

Bell, the tale of the, 278. 

Bernardo del Carpio, 27. 

Bishop of Spain, 192. 

Bishop Sisibert, 215. 

Bishop Turpin, 17. 

Boabdil, 218. 

Bordeaux, 14. 

Boston Public Library, 160, 

Buckingham Smith, 162. 

Buen Retiro, 220. 

Burdigala, 16. 

Burgos, 28. 

Cabrera, Don Jose, 192. 
Cadiz, 80. 
Calatayud, 232. 
Calcografia, 238. 
Calderon, Madame, 184. 
California discovered, 6. 
Canfranc, 301. 
Canon Alonzo, 214. 
Caradoc, 23. 

Cardinal Ximenes, 215, 240. 
Carlist War, 266. 
Carlos, Don, 183. 
Castelar, 180. 
Cathedrals, 66. 
Cavour, 170. 
Charles V., 52, 165. 
Chariot, 18. 
Cid's sword, 219. 



326 



INDEX. 



Civil service, 159. 

Clarimunda, 18. 

Ccena, %%. 

Columbian Library, 65. 

Columbus, 71. 

Comida, 88. 

Complutensian Polyglot, 241. 

Congress of Americanists, 163. 

Contreras, Senor, 96. 

Cordova, 40. 

Cortes, 174. 

Cuesta, 208. 

D'Aspe, 311. 
Dax, 20. 
Dejeuner, 88. 
Democratic-Dynastic, 180. 
Diligence, 134. 
Diodorus Siculus, 305. 
Documentos Ineditos, 162. 
Don Gayferos, 238. 
Don Quixote, 43. 
Don Ramiro, 261. 
Durandarte, 27. 
Dutch pictures, 222. 

El Dia, 180. 
El Pilar, 258. 
El Zagal, 90. 
Esplandian, 89. 
Exports, 176. 

Fans, 245. 

Ferdinand and Isabella, 132. 

First Parliament, 293. 

Flint-locks, 219. 

Folk-lore societies, 65. 

Fonda, 41. 

Fontarabia, 21. 

Fortuny, 107. 

Fox, Admiral, on Columbus, 117. 

Fra Agapida, 117. 

Franklin, 14. 

Fueros, 293. 



Galleries of Madrid, 24. 
Garcia Fernandez, 76. 
Garibaldi's death, 180. 
Gaspacho, 114. 
Gay's Pictorial History, 6. 
Gens d'armes, 137. 
Gibraltar, 84. 
Gothic blood, 177. 
Gothic church, 193. 
Goths, 11. 
Goya, 226. 
Granada, 72. 
Gregorio Mur, 285. 
Grice, Joseph, 220. 
Guadalajara, 243. 
Guadalquivir, 45, 71. 

Henry IV., of France, 317. 
Herrera, Senor, 176. 
Horticultural Gardens, 187. 
Hotels, 62. 
Huelva, 74. 
Huesca, 268. 
Huon of Bordeaux, 17. 
Hydrographical Bureau, 160. 

Impluvium, 150. 

Inglis, Miss F., 185. 

Inquisition, 65. 

Irrigation, 47. 

Irving, Washington, 94, 114. 

Irving's, Washington, Granada, S^ t 

218. 
Isabella II., 146, 171. 
Isabella Salon, 226. 

Jaca, 266, 278. 
Jaen, 134, 147, 179- 
Joshua, Book of, 10. 
Jubarra, 220. 

King Alfonso, 182. 
King Ramiro, 219, 294. 



INDEX. 



327 



La Mancha, 43. 

Landfall of Columbus, 117. 

Landscape of France, 15. 

Lathrop and Reinhart, 33, 211. 

Laurent's photographs, 238. 

Leonardo da Vinci, 222. 

Lepanto, Battle of, 219. 

Liberalism, 183. 

Libraries, 160. 

Lockhart's ballad, 32. 

Loja, 91. 

Madrazos, the Senores, 222, 227. 
Madrid, 36. 
Magerit, 229. 
Malaga, 80. 
Manzanares, 249. 
Maria de Rabida, 75. 
Marshal Serrano, 179. 
Martial, 210. 

Martines, Seiior Don Diego, 188. 
Mastery system, 9. 
Mayoral, 135. 
Medinacoeli, 233. 
Melisendra, Princess, 264, 279. 
Melons, 177. 
Moschena, 75. 
Mosque of Cordova, 57. 
Munoz's Collections, 162. 
Murillo, 62, 222, 224. 
Murray's guide-books, 34. 
Museums, 218. 

Napoleon I., 160, 219. 
National Library, 161. 
Naval expenses, 173. 
Navarrette, 115. 
Newspapers, 166. 

Oleron, 313. 
Orchata, 230. 
Orleans, 14. 

O' Shea's guide-book, 34. 
Osoria, Santa, 284. 



Pacific Ocean, 6. 
Paco, Perro, 198. 
Palos, 71. 

Panticosa baths, 266, 283. 
Pau, 315. 
Perro Paco, 198. 
Pertinax, 210. 
Philip II., 2ii. 
Philip IV., 165. 
Philippine Islands, 173. 
Pinzons, 72, 76. 
Pitcheries, 19. 
Politics, 178. 
Polyglot, 241. 
Post-houses, 137. 
Postilion, 138. 
Prado, 229. 
Prandium, S 1 /. 
Prendergast's system, 9. 
Prescott, W. H., 1. 
Protestant Church, 118, 131. 
Public works, 173. 
Pyrene, 307. 
Pyrenees, 305. 

Queen Isabella, 68, 182. 

Rabida, 75. 
Raphael, 222. 
Regnault, Henri, 107. 
Reinhart's drawings, 33. 
Republic, 180. 
Ricci (the excellent), 158. 
Roman antiquities, 15. 
Roman Catholic Church, 68. 
Roman ruins, 16. 
Roncesvalles, 23. 
Roswag's guide-book, 223. 
Royal Library, 160. 
Rubens, 222. 
Ruskin, 225. 

Sachetti, 220. 

Saint Anthony's vision, 66. 



328 



INDEX. 



Saint Christopher, 212. 
Saint Ildefonso, 215. 
Saint John's Day, 267. 
San Domingo, 57. 
Serrano, Marshal, 179. 
Sertorius, 269. 
Seville, 56, 221. 
Sierra Rallo, 134, 144. 
Siesta, 63. 
Siete Suelos, 98. 
Siguenza, 231. 
Somport, 303. 
Spanish Protestants, 131. 
Spanish Republic, 180. 
Stilts, 21. 
Strabo, 306. 

Talavera de la Reina, 207. 
Temperance, 232. 
Teutonic races, 12. 
Tiles in Seville, 221. 
Tinto River, y^. 
Toledo, 206. 



Triclinium, 150. 
Trifolium incarnatum, 15. 
Turpin, Archbishop, 17. 

Universitad Sertorio, 268. 
Urdos, 308. 

Val de Penas, 305. 
Valladolid, 159. 
Valle, Marques del, 164. 
Vandyke, 222. 
Vega, 92, 95, 137. 
Velasquez, 223, 239. 
Villa Nueva, 221. 

Wild-flowers, 301. 
Worship, 118. 

Xeres, 80. 

Ximenes, Cardinal, 194. 

Zagal, el, 135. 
Zaragoza, 247, 267. 



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